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AL AMONT ADA, 


THE 

GALLEY-SLAVE. 


A NARRATIVE* BY 

JOHAITIT HEZNUZCH Z)AZ7ZEL ZSGHOZZE. 



TRANSLATED FROM THE GERMAN 

BT ■' 

IRA G. MOSHER, LL.B, 

Meinungen und Begriffe lassen sich nicht beschneiden mit der 
eisernen Scheere der Gewalt. 


A.W-'i.U 3^ 

'F’V.- 

D. M. BENNETT, 

LIBERAL AND SCIENTIFIC PUBLISHING HOUSE, 


141 Eighth St., New Yoek, 





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THIS TRANSLATION 
I DEDICATE TO MY AGED MOTHER, 
KEZIAII MOSHER MATTOON, A WOMAN WHO NEVER 
ERRED BUT ON THE SIDE OF JUSTICE, 

MERCY, AND LOVE. 





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PREFACE. 


In offering this translation of “ Alamontada ” to an 
intelligent public, no apology for the author is neces- 
sary, as the name of Heinrich Zschokke is destined 
to become as familiar to the ear of the English-speak, 
ing people as that of Goethe, Schiller, or Lessing. 
That it is not so now is not on account of any de_ 
merits of the author, nor any inferiority of his works 
but because his time of life was later than theirs (he 
having died as recently as 1848), and because fewer 
of his works have been translated into the English 
language. 

As for myself, it is, perhaps, unnecessary to speak 
of the difficulties of rendering one language correctly 
into another, as all who hav attempted it, either in 
their collegiate days or subsequently, will at once ad- 
mit that they are many and perplexing. 

The aim has been to make a free rather than a 
strictly literal translation, yet keeping as close to the 
letter as possible without destroying its fluency in 
English. 

I must here acknowledge my indebtedness to Prof. 
Karl G. Edward, of Galesburg, 111., for the efficient 
service rendered as this translation has progressed 

This being a philosophical work on a subject that^ 
at present, so deeply moves the public, and which 
many of our best minds are so earnestly investigating 
— the relation of spirit to matter — and coming, as it 
does, from so eminent an author, it is worthy the 
careful perusal and study of all thinking persons. 

Iea G. Mo shee. 

Monmouth^ November, 1881. 


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PUBLISHER’S PREFACE TO THE GERMAN 
EDITION. 

The following narrativ was written in the winter 
of 1801-1802 at Bern, where the author, retired 
from public life, wished to dedicate his time to some 
useful purpose. Through intercourse he had become 
acquainted with many of those who were secretly 
troubled in spirit, and had learned or guessed at 
their hidden ailments, who, entangled in doubts, had 
lost their God and the joys of their existence. He 
would attempt to re-establish in their souls the sacred 
belief and faith in virtue. The touching dream of a 
night inspired him ; it was an angel that swept by 
him, but which he vainly tried to stop. As imper- 
fect as was the narrativ that at first appeared in 
1802 (published by Orell, Fuessli&Co., Zuerich), yet 
within the first decade it reached its fourth edition. 
This satisfied the author that he had not underesti- 
mated the usefulness of his work. Therefore he 
made some necessary, although still imperfect, im- 
provements. May it yet serve to refresh and 
strengthen many a spirit 1 


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' > *>0 S' ■ t : 


FIRST BOOK 


CHAPTER I. 

Abbe Dillon seated himself on a green grass-plot 
by the lake shore, shaded by an entangled foliage of 
trees hanging over us from the steep rocky wall. 

“ Here is room yet on my right and on my left,” 
said he, and his eyes smilingly invited us to rest by 
his side. Roderick seated himself, and I followed. 
All three were yet in silence, occupied following the 
train of thoughts of our interrupted conversation. 

On the opposit shore glowed the evening sky 
above the mountains, coloring the highest rocks and 
the peaceful Alpine huts with a mild rosy light. 
Golden stripes glimmered between bluish shades 
over the snowfields of the glaciers. In the distance 
the mountain peaks vanished in a violet hue among 
the clouds. 

“ By heaven !” exclaimed Roderick, who seemed 
to be deeply moved by the charms of the evening 
landscape, “how little is needed to be happy under 
the sun if one only nestles himself with childlike 
confidence closely to the bosom of the eternally good ' 
Mother Nature ! She is blameless, she is holy; and 
he who loves her, him she sanctifies ! And the anx- 
ious heart, excited by gloomy passions, reposes 
quietly on the maternal breast, and the hundreds of 
hopeless wishes are forgotten in a sigh of inmost 
contentment !” 


6 


ALAMONTADA. 


“ Excellent, my genial friend !” said I to him. 
“ And if this inmost happiness should ultimately 
prove only a sweet delusion, whether we are for a 
brief space of time promoted to the ranks of the 
gods by the magic power of wine, or the melody of 
music, or the beautiful play of colors of a landscape 
or something else, is quite the same.” 

The abbe smiled. Roderick grew gloomy, and 
continued after awhile, “And do you not believe 
that one can be very blissful, nay, lastingly bliss- 
ful?” 

“Very blissful? Oh, yes!” I answered. “But 
lastingly blissful? Well, if also in that I am to 
agree with you, you must first definitly explain 
what you term ‘ Mother Nature.’ You, dearest 
Roderick, are a poet; I am, unfortunately, a stiff, 
matter-of-fact man, who demands definit ideas. 
And therefore at times we do not at all agree, while 
our hearts always beat harmoniously. Let me speak 
open-heartedly. I took your exclamation at the 
sight of the lake scenery, so mildly illuminated by 
the setting sun, to be the result of your own happy 
disposition. But hav you always this happy dispo- 
sition ? Can you lastingly retain the same ? Does 
it depend upon you, arbitrarily, to giv to or take 
from yourself emotions ? Even feelings, even rea- 
son overwhelming emotions, belong to nature. You 
are young, you love and are loved. A beautiful 
future floats before you. Your fancy indulges in 
magic play. You are happy. But a few years flut- 
ter by ; your pulse beats slower ; your hair grows 
white, and the paradise, that yet blooms before you, 
extinguishes with the setting sun. Man is no two 
days alike.” 


AIAMONTADA. 


7 


The abbe grew serious. Roderick appeared to 
become a little sensitiv, “And^ with permission, 
what do you call happiness ?” said he. 

I answered: ‘‘Happiness I call contentment, and, if 
you will, pleasure, perchance. The happy man is so 
only through circumstances, only through circum- 
stances answering his desires. The poor one is made 
happy through inheritance, the industrious through 
the blessing of his industry, the fame-thirsty through 
the celebrity of his name, tlie lover through returned 
love — but all this is the work of circumstances. 
These changed^ and the happy one becomes misera- 
ble.” 

“That Is not what I mean!” said Roderick; “I 
speak of a state of the soul in which one feels last- 
ingly at peace with one’s self.” 

“ There is,” I replied, “ there is on earth no last- 
ing happiness nor lasting unhappiness, because cir- 
cumstances never remain the same, but daily change. 
But I know a certain state of mind and heart which 
I call blissfulness, because in this beautiful world 
two great ideas, soul and eternity, ai-e mysteriously 
united. This state is independent of chance, above 
the vicissitudes of earthly things. The soul itself 
must prepare it, and it may last forever. Powerful 
time, even, which dries out our bodies, bleaches our 
hair, amd devastates our senses, has no influence over 
it. Fortune can not increase nor misfortune dimin- 
ish it. It is not connected with either, and it alone 
increases happiness and decreases misery. Is it this 
blissfulness, this inexhaustible contentment, Roder- 
ick, that you mean ?” 

“ That’s it !” exclaimed Roderick. 

‘ “ Virtue, the spring is called. Not eveiy^body 


ALA^ONTADA. 


S: 

earth can be happy, but everybody on earth can create 
for himself this blissfulness. For within the breast 
of every mortal lies the moral law and the irresist- 
ible reverence for the same. The man who need 
not blush before himself in the remembrance of his 
own deeds, the man with pure heart, stands above 
the workings of destiny; he is equally blissful in the 
depths of misery as upon the hights of prosperity. 
We hav beneath the moon nothing under our con- 
trol; outside of ourselvs nothing belongs to us last- 
ingly. To become rich, renowned, and beloved does 
not depend upon us; to be virtuous depends on each 
individual’s will. Fate is our master in everything, 
but over our virtue no fate has control. This is the 
blissful state for which all should strive, and, Rod- 
erick, it is really not so difficult. Act so that you 
never lose your self-respect ! — behold, this is the 
thread that will lead us out of the labyrinth. 
Goodness of soul imparts to man that highness, that 
self-reliance, which makes him godlike and a citizen 
of two worlds. Before him the crowns of earth sink 
unattractiv in the dust, and death itself through him 
is deprived of its terrors. With virtue in my heart 
I am on earth in paradise. I desire an eternity, an 
imperishable existence of my soul beyond the grave, 
but I am not in need of that to complete my blissful- 
ness here on earth. The virtuous man, independent 
of the world that surrounds him, elevated above 
fate’s storms and sunshine, expects nothing even from 
ä future after death. He is free. So is God free. 
The philosopher accepts what falls to him, as gift, 
as fortune, without demanding it as a recompense 
for sacrifices made. For that is no virtue that de- 
mands reward I” 


ALAMONTADA. 


0 


Roderick stared at the ground before him, lost in 
meditation. 

Abb6 Dillon, who had hitherto remained silent, 
laid his arm around me, and pressed me to his bosom. 
“ Friend,” said he, “ thy ideal of virtue is more than 
human. Like him, none has yet walked on earth. 
Ah, where is that holy soul which at the grave can 
smilingly renounce a recompensing eternity ?” 

“ Your virtue is more terrible than lovable !” 
added Roderick. 

I answered : Dear friends, if I in my dying hour 
shall hav cool consciousness — if from this moment to 
the next were my last — so would I myself be the 
man T\ith that awful renunciation, although I am 
none of the most virtuous among men. I hav no 
right to ask recompense for my virtue, consequently 
I need no eternity for it, and much less for my mis- 
takes.” 

Roderick looked at me with doubtful eyes. 
“ Really,” said he, “ I can hardly believe that you 
are speaking in earnest. Your virtue is an awful 
goddess, whom I cannot worship. No man, born of 
dust, w 11 ever embrace her. A virtue which is so 
self-suf cient that she needs neither an eternity nor 
a god an only be an attribute of a god, and not of 
a tender, human heart.” 

“ Your judgment is too severe,” answered I. “We 
speak of that which might procure for us lasting 
blissfulness, independent of the fickleness of fortune. 
I say that the consciousness of having done 
right can accomplish this. My house can become 
the prey of flames; a revolution can annihilate my 
rights and bring me to poverty; death can overtake 
father, mo her, sister in my arms. I shall sufi'er, in- 


10 


ALaMONTADA. 


tensely suffer, be very unhappy, but all this is not 
sufficient to destroy the inmost peace of my soul, for 
there will remain to me the one consolation that I 
am not to blame for these misfortunes I Were my 
grief so great that I could not master the thought; 
why weepest thou over the perishable ? Could thou 
expect anything else from dust ? then time would 
bring about what the strength of my soul would be 
unable to accomplish ; it would heal the wound. A 
few years, and over the ruins of my hut and the 
graves of my loved ones will grow the moss of for- 
getfulness. With the consciousness of virtue in my 
heart I fear the sword of no tyrant, and no hemlock- 
bowl. I shall just as quietly receive alms as bestow 
them. I shall go to my grave with the same tran- 
quillity as to my bed. What can you say against 
that, dear abbe, and you, my beloved Roderick ? 
Tell me, if you can, another source of blissfulness, 
beside this ! I know only this, that so long as I am 
virtuous, the peace of my heart i < preserved, and I 
am blissful. I need no other hope. It depends on 
me to be good, and, consequently to be lastingly 
blissful.” 

The abbe said : “ You come very near the truth. 
Virtue can contribute much to our peace, but not 
all. Am I mistaken, my beloved ones, if I believe 
that each one of you takes too one-sided a view of 
man? The one of you sees in him nothing but the 
sensual being, exposed to the wildest storms, as well 
as to the gentlest flattering breezes of life; the other 
views him only as spirit, and only as such independ- 
ent of flesh and blood ! Ah, my beloved ones, let us 
ask of ourselvs, for the sake of a one sided opinion. 


l.I*A MONT ADA. 


11 


ireither too much nor too little. Let us remember 
that we are not merely spirit ! ” 

I thought it proper to interrupt the abbe, saying, 
‘‘You are of the opinion, then, that virtue alone, 
and the consciousness of having done right, are in 
themselvs not sufficient to make us lastingly blissful?” 

“Very well, I do not mean to be mistaken,” 
replied Dillon, “ You remarked a little while ago 
that no misfortunes were able to disturb the blissful 
condition of a righteous man. O friend, I hav seen, 
during my long life, many a noble mantowhom his 
virtue has given no consolation. Just take an every- 
day life’s occurrence. Hav you not among your 
acquaintances an upright man who suffers from hyp- 
ochondria? The good-natured hypochondriac who 
for the welfare of his fellow-man makes the greatest 
sacrifices will yet anxiously draw in question his 
own virtue. He sees committed faults floating be- 
fore him like gigantic specters, and of the good seed 
that he has sown he knows not where it fell. At 
ail events, I believe there is in this world none so 
wholly disconsolate and unhappy as the hypochon- 
driac who prefers the unconsciousness of sleep, cr 
non-existence, to wakefulness, or even the conscious- 
ness of high honesty. But you will tell me he is 
sick! Well, my dear, he is nevertheless a man 
without a blissful disposition, notwithstanding all his 
virtue. This, therefore, does not suffice to make him 
happy.” 

Roderick assented to- the, abbe. I felt the force 
of his objection, as I myself knew one of the noblest 
men, who, in spite 'of all his self-denial, never felt 
that sacred quietude of his inmost being which I 
h^d n^de ^e heritage of the pure heart. 


12 


ALAMONTADA. 


Dilloh'continued after a pause: “Man is not spirit 
alone ; he is so closely interwoven with the physical 
that we hardly dare draw the linq between the two. 
Therefore the most virtuous one is not always 
pleased with the memory of his past, and tlie honest 
man can be plunged into circumstances where the 
consciousness of goodness alone is incapable of giving 
him consolation, much less of raising him above his 
misery. Nay, still more, we are not always strong 
enough, with the best will, to let our reason speak; 
we only too often sink relaxed back into the embrace 
of our sensual nature. Here, my beloved ones, is 
needed another staff on which the sufferer may lean 
if he is not to become a prey to his misery.” 


CHAPTER II. 

Dillon was silent. I felt myself not entirely re- 
futed, but my positions, which I believed to hav uni- 
versal value, were opposed only by exceptions and 
doubts. The opponent had only aroused, not satis- 
fied, my curiosity. “It needs another staff than 
virtue,” STid he, but as yet he had not named it. 

I turned to him, and noticed now that he was 
occupied with a great thought, or under the influence 
of a powerful emotion. The venerable man leaned 
liis arm uyjon a rock; his head had sunk down upon 
his breast; A melancholy seriousness was visible in 
every feature, which otherwise wore only the ex- 
pression of the mildest repose, 
i ■ My friend Roderick, also, was not indifferent to 
the melancholy mood of the abbe. 

. “You are growing sad,” said he, and pressed his 
hand warmly. “Lookup, dear Dillon, the eyqiung 


ALAMONTADA. 


13 


is too beautiful; shall we willingly spoil our enlov- 
ment of it ? 

“It is true,” said Dillon, and smiled again. “But 
I am not sad. Our conversation touched the most 
beautiful secrets and desires of humanity. There 
arose in my memory a thousand presentations and 
recollections, and I saw again in spirit that saintly 
form which had appeared to me in the days of my 
youth, and to my erring soul, like a genius, showed 
the better path — good Alamonlada ! calm, amiable 
sufferer ! Am I not right, beloved ones, you know 
this dear name already?” 

“ To me it is entirely unknown,” said I, “and yet 
I believe I hav heard you mention it once before.” 

“ Alamontada 1 ” exclaimed Roderick; “ what ! the 
galley-slave, from whom you read to me that sub- 
lime passage out of yonder bundle of papers? Truly 
I am sorry that the fellow, with all his genius, 
ended at the galleys. He might hav risen to emi- 
nence. But how then? You seem to esteem him 
from still another side, as you giv him that flattering 
title.” 

“ Of him I can speak only with reverence,” snid the 
aged man ; “ he has been to me, throughout the whole 
course of my life, the most remarkable personage. 
Through him I was restored to myself and the world. 
Oh, what unspeakable prood he has done me ! 
and not even a ‘thank you ’ has he received in return.” 

Dillon was deeply moved. Beneath his gray eye- 
lashes melted a tear. His lips quivered as if whis- 
pering in low tones. The melancholy mood of the 
venerable old man seemed to impart itself to us, and 
each one gave himself up to the turbulent current of 
his eiiiolious; none disturbed the other’s meditation. 


14 


4l-AM0:^TAJ)A.. 


1 shall never forget this beautiful moment. Even 
nature about us seemed syrapathizingly to enter 
into our dreams. We sat in the shade of the rocks; 
but before us floated in a bright, half-transparent 
mist the mountain range with its peaceful Alpine 
world, the bights of which were wreathed with the 
glory of a gold-red sky. And darkly, between them 
and here, the lake spread itself beneath our feet. 
So separates the fathomless grave from the paradise 
of eternity, which we sometimes behold in imagina- 
tion. 

Like a soft breath from the other shore, the even- 
ing air, slightly ruffling the surface of the lake, 
floated coolingly around our temples, and lost itself, 
sounding in the thicket above us like a sigh. 

Dillon awoke. He seized our hands, drew us near 
him, and said: “You, loved ones, are young and. 
happy ! Easy it is to smile when life smiles upon 
us, and to find order and goodness everywhere, and 
in the hours of leisure to build systems for hu- 
manity.” 

“ You hav really alarmed me, dear abbe,” said I 
to him,” and all that I hear from you assures me that 
for some unknown reason you deviate from my own 
convictions. But, I conjure you, explain yourself 
more fully. Tell me, what is there in this world 
better and more consoling than virtue? What com- 
fort in suffering is sweeter than that which innocence 
givs to our souls? What strengthens the heart more 
against a world full of enemies than the feeling of 
uprightness? I know no other support in the day of 
trial than this. Nature offers it to every mortal.” 

“Well, ray beloved ones,” said the abbe, “the 
evening is beautiful. We cannot enjoy it bettor 


ALAMONTADA. 


15 


than in mutual conversation, in which the soul must 
lift itself up to the sanctuaries of humanity. As I 
before spoke the name of Alamontada, I was then 
ready to do what you now ask of me. I wanted to 
relate to you who that noble one was, and how I 
made his acquaintance, and how he departed from 
me. These, recollections of him are still beneficial 
and refreshing to me.” 

‘‘Relate I” cried Roderick. “A man, a galley- 
slave, whom Dillon honors with so much sincerity 
must be an extraordinary man.” 

“ Before I begin the story itself,” said the abbe, 
“ may I first be allowed a remark? You must, be- 
fore you hear the narrativ, become acquainted with 
Alamontada’s spirit; without the latter you would 
not be able to understand the former. You would, 
as it were, stand beside a beautiful corpse, and long 
in vain for its missing soul. 

“ You also hav (and your happy youth protects you 
not against the serious thought that, sooner or later, 
comes to every independent thinker with irresistible 
force) you also hav already, as your conversations 
betray, meditated upon the aim and destinv of your 
existence upon this earth. I request you to pursue 
this thought; for what is there of greater impor- 
tance to us here below ? 

“ Man is born, by slow degrees becomes conscious 
of existence, and ripens into maturity. Without his 
wish he was placed in this endleps universe. An 
unknown power thrust him into this life of turmoil 
between flowers and thorns ; he smiles among those, 
and weeps bleeding beneath these, and asks, ‘Who 
cast me hither? Who has the right to deprive me 


16 


ALAMONTADA. 


of what I possessed before, insensibility, non-exist* 
ence?’ But no voice responds to his questions. 

“He may console himself about the darkness from 
which he emerged, but he does not remain indifferent 
to the changes of the present. ‘ Who am I ? ’ asks 
he. ‘ What am I to do in this world ? Why must I 
liv ? Is it to learn an art, a handicraft, or a science, 
by means of which I can finally procure for myself 
a shelter, food, clothes, and certain comforts of 
life? That would be a miserable aim, not worth 
the pain of existence and the many tears. And yet 
every thing in human life tends toward that, as if 
that were the principal object. Every one labors, 
gathers, presses on to increase wealth, possession, 
and power, and is suspended between cares and 
hopes, and judges others only by this standard. 
Tlie world thus resembles a desert, in which all seek 
and struggle and save in order to secure themselvs 
against starvation. 

“ Or was I placed here to gather wisdom among 
the flowers and beneath the thorns? To train my 
mental faculties? To exercise the biddings of my 
reason? The aim would be nobler. But that which 
is my aim should be the aim of aH. And yet that is 
not the case. Sorrow and care concerning bodily 
wants consume the greater portion of the time of 
life. Only single hours belong to our intellectual 
being. Of the millions of our fellow-beings only 
the few care for the development of their mental 
powers and the acquirement of high virtues. Na- 
tions hav arisen and disappeared again without the 
slightest conception of such an aim. And why, then, 
did they liv? Are not the thousands of human 
beings, who, with confused ideas, in constant dark- 


ALAMONTADA. 


17 


ness, hurry from the cradle to their graves, human 
beings like myself? The suckling who, without the 
knowledge that he was, died on his mother’s bosom) 
was he not a human being like myself? Is his des- 
tiny different from my own? 

“They answer: No, we are not created for this 
world below. Our destiny lies beyond the horizon 
of earthly existence. We must through virtue merit 
a better life. A hell is prepared for vice ; a heaven 
for virtue. But how, if I would already find here 
below that our virtue deserves rarely a heaven, our 
vices rarely a hell? Are not heaven and hell inven- 
tions of an ignorant past, which for the divine within 
and without had not yet a language; are they not 
figurativ representations of the mind, the spirit which 
seeks a connection between itself and the eternal 
All ? Who has revealed to us a heaven, who a hell ? 
Christians say, God, thi'ough his word. But the 
heathen? and he whom education, fate, and inde- 
pendent thinking has led far from the teachings of 
his fathers ? 

I am destined for another world ; why must I be 
in this one? Perhaps in order to prepare myself for 
the former? But what preparation had the dying 
suckling? Why did he appear, scarcely conscious 
of existence, to smile and weep? Am I destined 
for another world? Why, then, is it veiled from me? 
Why does no voice from the realm of the dead speak 
to me?” 

With a pale face, Roderick arose at these words 
of Dillon. “Alas! abbe,” cried he, “you! even 
you ! How very unhappy am I ! I bore my disease 
in secret, and was ashamed to expose to othei-s my 
hidden suffering. In you, only in you, I had confi-. 


18 


ALAM0NTAÖA. 


dence; I chose you for my physiciam Ahl and 
with a shudder I see the physician lay bare his 
wounds, and recognize in them my own !” 

At first I was startled by Roderick’s violent emo- 
tion. I seized his hand and said: How, dear Rod- 
erick, is that which Dillon has said so awful to you? 
I am sorry to hav made these things the topic of our 
conversation. But long ago these thoughts were 
familiar to me; long ago I relinquished my most 
beautiful hopes, and resigned myself to my cheerless 
fate, which is the fate of all mortals. Roderick, I 
also hav suffered like yourself. But I hav now ar- 
rived at a conclusion. I will be virtuous, and with 
this virtue in my arms I will meet my doom with- 
out terror and without complaint. If there is a 
God, and he has with him and in his dominion the 
sweet word recompense, so highly appreciated even 
among mortals, alone for us children of the dust no 
value — then I will perish, perish with the proud con- 
sciousness, the repaying satisfaction : ‘ Thou gavest 
to me what I did not ask, a life full of tears; but I 
hav borne it — borne it with courage, borne it in self- 
denial, and felt myself worthy of imperishableness 
and a better world. Thou dost not grant it to me. 
Be it thus! No complaint shall cross my Jips. So 
I am greater than the world- managing fate ! ’ ” 

Roderick looked gloomily upon the ground. My 
talk did not seem to please him. He shook his head. 

“No, oh, nol” cried he, with painful voice; “I 
hav too much feeling to become groat. I am a 
human being, and more I would not wish to be. I 
do not want anything else but that I may not in the 
universe play the part of a madman, who secs every- 
thing without more beautiful than it is in reality. 


AI^MO$T4X^A. 


19 


I d^jsire nothing but that the outer world be in har- 
mony with my inner world; that my reason should 
not delude me, and my heart not betray me. Woe 
unto me, if I am not rescued from this labyrinth ; if 
you possessed the truth, and I had imbibed my hap- 
piness only on the breast of a pious dream, I 
should only in vain bless my delusion, would in vain 
sacrifice for it all your truth, and repurchase lost 
happiness at no price ! ” 

Uoderick’s complaint moved me. I arose and 
clasped him in my arms. “ Dear Roderick,” said I 
to him, “why then so faint-hearted? Joy also 
reclines in the lap of truth. Am I not one of the 
merriest men, in spite of all convictions, which you 
find so awful ? Am I not a tender friend, a pleasant 
companion, a good relativ? Do I not find pleasure 
everywhere; and is it not I who gladly givs these 
things to others ? Quiet yourself. Truth is man’s 
happiness, the aim of reason; delusions may, per- 
haps, be pleasing in dawning childhood’s time.” 

“ No, nö ! ” cried Roderick. “ I long for this dawn- 
ing childhood’s time, after that vernal sky. Your 
truth strips all blossoms off, and takes the brightness 
out of nature, and turns the warm heart to ice.” 


CHArrER in. 

Abb4 Dillon, who had thus far listened to us m 
silence, now arose. “Hear me also,” said he. “ Both 
of you will, by the difference of your manner of per- 
ception, your fancy, and your mode of reasoning, 
scarcely ever become of one mind, one faith, one 
conviction. And your lot is the lot of all humanity. 


20 


alamontada. 


Roderick’s pain grieves me. But perhaps I am not 
so diseased as he at first feared, and may yet hav 
balm even for him. That you both would inquire 
after your destiny, into the nature of your being, 
and concerning the value of your hopes, came not 
unexpected to me. Both of you bore wounds out of 
the battle between truth and deception ; still the dif- 
ference between you two is, after all, not so great as 
you think. The wounds of the one are still bleed- 
ing; while those of the other, are, it is true, closed, 
but by no means healed. A thrust, and their light 
covering bursts. Both of you stepped out of the 
beautiful dreams of childhood and beheld that 
which you hitherto hoped and believed fade like a 
shadow before the light of growing knowledge. The 
one wants to return to the old, lovely delusions, and 
summons for that his feelings and the power of his 
imagination. He struggles in vain. For it does 
not grow dark again as long as the light of better 
•knowledge burns. The other arms himself with the 
pride of reason, and wants to harden himself against 
the most beautiful desires of nature.* Pie, too, strug- 
gles in vain. For so long as his heart beats it will 
beat in accord with his desires.” 

“How, Dillon, will you rob us of all consolation: 
even of that, finally, to forget what wretched crea- 
tures we are in the universe, if we fully know our- 
selvs ? ” cried I in terror. 

“ In trutV’ sighed Roderick, “ very wretched, the 
most wretched in the universe ! The animal is to bo 
envied, which in irrational blissfulness creeps along, 
enjoys the merry moments of existence, and disap- 
peara, without lamenting the joys of the past, with- 


ALAMONTADA. 21 

out fearing the darkness of the future, without know- 
ing his fate.” 

Dillon smiled at us. His look was full of gentle 
sympathy, lie uncovered his head, and the wind 
played in his thin locks. “ Look here,” said he, “ my 
hair is snow-white. My life is spent. I expect 
every day that busy death will knock at my cham- 
ber-door. I expect him without trembling, and 
when he comes, away I fling my crutch, and with 
pleasure sink into his friendly, outstretched arms. 
Remember, beloved ones, this is no doing of haugh- 
ty reason ; no consequent of artificial delusion ; for 
my phantasy is lame, and for many years my blood 
has run slower. But there is yet something else 
which givs us courage, and I hav found it. I also 
hav battled and suffered, like you. I also hav been 
in the desperate mood, like you, where all my hopes 
broke down. But the angel who has restored me ‘ 
shall also heal your wounds. Be, therefore, not 
angry if I tear the bandages from them, and let 
them bleed afresh — bleed to death you shall not. 
But I am tired. Let us sit down here on the rocks. 
The evening is lovely. We converse undisturbed.” 

We followed the invitation of the amiable old 
man, who spoke with such assurance and cheerful- 
ness that he woud hav imbued even the strongest 
doubter with confidence. 

“I know your condition,” said he; “but do not 
imagin you are the only ones who suffer from these 
doubts. Every man of some degree of education will 
finally reach the point where you are as soon as he 
has roamed long enough, and in vain, about the edge 
of human knowledge. But few speak of it, fearing 
to make other», through their comfortless meditar- 


22 


ALAMONTADA. 


tioDs, as miserable as themselvs. Or they conceal 
their grief, not because they fear to be misunderstood, 
but to become ridiculous and despised. Many of 
them take their silent grief with them into their 
graves. Many of them deaden their grief in sensual 
extravagance, and while they become vicious in order 
to replace the loss of higher joys by low ones, they 
use their rude philosophy as a cloak to hide their 
mean desires. Many of them make an artificial self- 
deception, wrap themselvs in delusions, and beccme 
the most zealous church-goers, as they were before 
the most zealous scoffers. Yea, beloved ones, your 
disease is more general than you thought it to be. It 
rages in the dark. I hear everywhere regrets at the 
decay of religion, because the churches become 
empty, and half of those who still visit them visit 
them only habitually or for business’ sake. I hear the 
fathers complain that the sons are ashamed to pray. 
I hear the mothers sigh that the daughters bl«ish to 
speak an earnest word of God. It is certain tl at the 
reading of many an author and the cheering up of 
the ideas does harm to the ordinary church lifi-. But 
it is a mistake to believe that with the church relig- 
ion would be forgotten. God and immortaliiy will 
never be forgotten. The youth and the maiden cling 
in solitude to these lofty objects, perishableness be- 
comes their church, and death therein occupies the 
pulpit. But the youthful powers, too little exercised, 
soon succumb. The belief in revelaKon, formerly 
their support, lies broken there. They are too feeble 
to hold themselvs up without this support, theiefoi'e 
they soon sink into despondency, which dissolves 
into some kind of silent desperation and grasps after 
the sad remedies which I mentioned before.” 


▲LAMONTADA. 23 

‘‘Ahf” sighed Roderick; “you hav there related 
to me my own history.” 

Dillon answered : “And to you I hav related mine. 
But that is not yet the end of it. Now, if you will 
listen to me, I will relate to you also the history of 
my recovery.” 


CHAPTER IV. 

Abh^ Dnion had long since strained our expecta- 
tion toward that point, and the more so as he was, 
in spite of his liberal views in church matters of 
faith, an example of sincere piety, and, notwith- 
standing his old age, cheerfulness personified. The 
whole country around venerated the old man; but 
no one knew him better than the unfortunate and 
the children, for he loved best to be with them. He 
had the most singular ability to find out the woe of 
the one with whom he became acquainted ; his look, 
which glided over the face of the stranger, was suf- 
ficient to detect the man, and in a short, apparently 
unimportant, conversation to penetrate his inmost 
being. Every sufferer found in the excellent man 
not only a consoler, a sympathizing friend, but the 
real companion of his own misfortunes. One sooner 
felt himself at home than acquainted with him, and 
when he taught, we believed to hear from his lips 
not his but our own thoughts and secret desires 
more definitly arranged and more clearly presented. 

He accordingly began his narrativ, and said: “In 
my youth I was a wild fellow, and would hav liked 
to become a soldier. Man then feels himself swell- 


ALAMONTADA. 


ing with power, and sets himself up against the 
world of the Almighty, and fancies to be a match 
at the same time for the powers of heaven and hell. 
But my parents did not agree with me. They hated 
earthly war, but loved more that of the spirit against 
the powers of darkness. They consequently dedi- 
cated me a soldier of Christ on earth, and I, with 
childlike resignation to their will, carried out the 
wish of the gray-haired couple, and entered the cler- 
ical profession. 

“I devoted myself thereto — that is, my whole 
being was soon absorbed by it. A youth, with 
glowing fancy, does nothing by halves. My ambi- 
tion, without hope, to shake the world through 
arms, now dreamed to fill all churches of Christen- 
dom with the glory of sanctity. I became a relig- 
ious enthusiast. Solitude, and the quiet splendor of 
the monastery in which I lived, the reading of the 
church history, of the persecutions of the Christians, 
of the suffering of our saints and martyrs, inflamed 
me. I looked upon the world as a large church, in 
which God himself was the high-priest. Love com- 
pleted my pious folly. I made the acquaintance of 
a young lady, whose beauty charmed me, whose 
bashful friendship drew a paradise around my soli- 
tude. I made a sacrifice of love and my wounded 
heart. So I fancied to hav made the first step to- 
ward brotherhood with all saints. While I saw 
heaven smile upon me, I felt flattered by the dreams 
of a hopelessly loving young girl. How great, how 
cleansed from the gross matter of this earth, I felt 
myself ! I wanted now to enter into an order , of 
monks. But my parents kept me back. I became ä 


ALAMONTADA. 


25 


secular priest, and soon received through the influ- 
ence of my relativs a well-paying parish. 

“ No sooner was I living without the walls of the 
monastery than the enthusiasm of my extreme piety 
vanished. I found the turmoil of a large seaport 
more agreeable than the leaden monotony of the 
sacred walls. My ambition remained the same; it 
only changed the aim. I determined to become 
one of the first scholars and authors of our century 
and of all coming centuries. 1 had selected the far- 
extending fields of theology and philosophy for my 
battlefield. My first work was intended to be the 
impenetrable segis of revealed religion against all 
attacks of doubt and mockery. 

“ I read, I meditated, I wrote, and before I was 
aware of it I found myself standing with my weap- 
ons turned upon the tabernacle which I had under- 
taken to defend. The corruptions which had per- 
vaded the church made me suspicious of the church, 
and the church finally made me mistrust religion. 
So I became a prodigal son thereof. I at length 
would for my own consolation erect a new structure 
out of the ruins of the fallen one. Vain attempt ! 
These ruins, what were they? Ancient prejudices 
from the childhood days of the human race; tattered 
delusions, broken-down hopes. My peace, my hap- 
piness, was gone. I bewailed the peace of my inno- 
cent childhood, ransacked in vain the rubbish of my 
dreams, cursed in vain my audacious undertaking to 
penetrate the secrets of the spiritual world. There 
I lay, miserable and crushed, like the giants under 
their rocks, who, dissatisfied with this earth, would 
open for themselvs a way into the realms of the 
gods. 


26 


AI^AMONTADÄ. 


“For light I had striven, and now found myself 
in endless darkness. I would draw nearer to God, 
but at my approach it seemed that he had left this 
chaotic universe. Where I formerly, with reveren- 
tial awe, imagined his presence, I found nothing but 
dead remains of self-consuming nature. I wanted 
to draw the veil from eternity, and stared into an 
endless grave, wherein lay the silence of destruction, 
and all darkening forgetfulness. 

“No effort was spared to rescue me from my de- 
spairing wisdom. I searched for truth. Only truth, 
full conviction, indisputable knowledge, could satisfy 
me, not probability, not uncertain opinion and fickle 
belief. I examined the whole circle of my experi- i 
ences, my sad researches, hoping always finally to I 
discover an error which might overthrow my discon- 
solate wisdom, and lead me back into the lovely old 
realms. In vain I The temble certainty remained 
that I must continue in eternal darkness. 

“ ‘What is the world?’ asked I, and found myself 
again at the naiTow limits of human wisdom. I see 
colors, forms, and changes, I hear sound, I feel 
hardness and softness of things, which I call bodies, 
and yet I do not know the things, but only their out- 
side, their effect upon my skin, my nerves. I see 
masks, but not the actors behind them; I see phe- 
nomena, but not their cause. Is this outside of the 
things a property thereof ? Or is it a result of the 
incomprehensible construction of my senses ? This 
again I know not. For the slightest change in my 
sensual organs changes the world; one sense more, 
and before me arises a new world. 

“And these, my senses, what are they? How can 
I through these skins, tubes, muscles, and fhiids 


ALAMONTADA. 


27 


como to a clear conception of the things that float 
without? How can you turn the sensual into the 
spiritual, the real into the imaginary? Is the har- 
mony which I find throughout the world property 
of that which is hid behind the phenomena which I 
call bodies, and which I distinguish after their im- 
pression upon my nerves, or is it the working of 
those tubes, muscles, and fluids? Or the result of 
the organization of my imagination, which I now 
call soul, then spirit? 

“ What is my soul? Here I meet the same difii 
culty as before regarding the objects of the sensual 
world. I know my own existence only through acts 
or various kinds. What I am myself, that can pro- 
duce all these, I again know not. My spirit is an 
invisible fountain ; I see streams of my deeds flow 
forth, without knowing from whence they come. 
I am the savage, without looking-glass, who knows 
the forms of all his friends, except his own, which 
he has never seen. 

“ What a confusion ! I am, without knowing who 
I am, in connection with things that I do not know. 
And why am I thus? Why not different? How 
came I as a part to this universe? Was there a 
time when I was nothing? Who drew me ^orth to 
self-consciousness? What shall I do on this myste- 
rious stage? 

“ Questions, eternal questions, to which no re- 
sponse is given. I cannot fathom my existence; nor 
whether I hav been placed here with my own self as 
an object in view, or as a means for strange, dark 
purposes. I am forced into this universe, and must 
now remain here, without knowing whether I can 
ever free myself from it by my own strength. I can 


ALAMONTADA. 


28 

destroy the instrument, this body, through which 1 act 
and produce appearances; but, in doing so, I hav no 
certainty whether I hav not with that destroyed the 
unknown, which causes the acts. I can burn up the 
wood, but what hav I destroyed? Certainly not 
the primitiv substance, the being, which showed that 
outside, that I called wood, but only the shape, the 
color, the coherence; and I now call the appearance, 
after the changed form and color, ashes. The prim- 
itiv substance remains; I hav not destroyed it, else i 
it could not produce other phenomena. 

“ Thore I stand, uncertain whAither I am able to 
free myself from the universe, or whether I must 
continue to exist. Continue to exist? and what' 
for? Was I with the universe from eternity — why 
do I not know it? And if I continue to exist, shall ' 
I know again that I was there? I stagger through 
impenetrable darkness, and knock everywhere 
against the iron bars of human understanding. 
What country lies beyond these limits? 

“ That the world so appears, as I perceive it, is 
not because it is so in reality, but because my senses 
are so constructed that I am compelled to see it as I 
do. Compelled ? How could it be otherwise ? I 
obey in. my perceptions laws that I did not make for 
myself. I cannot make myself independent of them. 

I cannot break the order in which I enjoy all sensa- 
tions and perceptions. So I fancy to myself every- 
thing following in succession, or in time. Time is 
nothing without me. I smell, feel, taste, hear, and 
see it not. Time is something within me; and yet . 
not a mere notion, for that could change, but a part 
of my organization, a law, a form, in which I am 
forced to let all my ideas succeed each other. 


ALAMONTADA. 


29 


Reigns, as within the turmoil of my thoughts and 
sensations, also without in the dark universe, a time, 
a succession ? Is there a past and a future there, or 
are these both merely formations of my mind ? Are 
both my beginning and end in this universe, or 
merely in the world of my perceptions ? 

‘‘And whence comes this world of my perceptions ? 
Who built this strangely interworking machinery, 
which, without knowing how and what and why it 
is, only realizes that it runs and thrives and works ? 
Who was its originator? How must it hav been 
created? Who is the creator’s creator? Is it nec- 
essary that all things should hav a beginning? 
What was before the beginning of the universe? 
Are not beginning, creation, cause, again perceptions, 
which I gather from the appearances of the poor, 
sensual world, or of the peculiar organization of my 
n.ind? May not the case be with these things quite 
different than in the narrow circle of ideas of my 
own self? Why do I bear the idea of a God? Be- 
cause I cannot explain the mystery of this world 
without this key. But this key again turns into a 
mystery ; how shall I explain this without a second 
God ? And what hav I then ? Where then am I to 
stop ? And there again I knock against the barrier 
of my reason; I cannot escape from the magic circle 
in which I am confined. 

“So, beloved ones, I staggered from doubts to 
doubts. I lost myself in a desert. I saw a world 
full of idolized impostors and their victims; the 
whole human race in delusions about itself. The 
do3ds of kings and their heroes resembled fearful 
ragings; the works of philosophers and theologians, 
childish fiibk'S. I saw millions of knees bend be- 


30 


ALÄIONTADA. 


fore altars, before an unknown being, wliose exist- i 
ence was not even guaranteed by reason. I saw 
millions of hearts break in death with the hope that i 
the breath of the Almighty would again gather and j 
warm their scattered dust for more beautiful worlds, j 
“And yet all these, who smiled and died in their 
error, were, perhaps, happy. How willingly, cried 
I often, would I giv all my wisdom for your dreams. 
For me, too, nature once bloomed in her splendor; 
and her beauty was animated, and an angelic spirit 
spoke to me out of her wonders. Hot in vain the 
transparent dome spanned itself above me, and float- 
ed in it the beautiful stars. Every star, to me at 
that time a more beautiful world, shone full of mys- 
terious meaning down into the tears of the inhabi- 
tants of this earth; and a foreboding of the eternal 
and eternal-recompensing breathed through the 
firmament and over the shuddering earth and on the 
glowing hearts. And when the spring morning 
kindled the skies and colored the mountains, and llio 
valleys awoke with the warbling of the lurk, when 
the song of awakened creatures swelled up toward* 
heaven, my knees bent in joy, and I would pray in 
the dust, hundreds of flowers waving around my 
head, and my tears intermingled with the dew of 
the rose. Ah ! then it sounded from the depths 
and from the hights : God is etern al love. At that 
time I still strewed flowers upon the graves, and 
called the coffin the cradle of the second life. And 
the first tear of grief that fell upon the loved dead 
one was at the same time the first tear of love and 
longing, soon to be again united with him, where no 
sigh moves the weary bosom, and blissfulness reigns 
without end. 


ALAMONTADA. 


U 

And see, my beloved ones,” continued Dillon, 
I was very happy. But I endeavored to lift my- 
self up, and to bear with manly courage a fate 
which I believed myself unable to change. With- 
out knowing whether there was a ruling God, and 
immortality my lot, I honored the laws of virtue 
and felt in their keeping now and then some conso- 
lation. In this frame of mind it was that I found 
myself in Toulon, and there it was that I made the 
acquaintance of the man who restored to me my 
lost peace.” 


CHAPTER V. 

One day,” so related our abbe, “ I received the 
order to go into the hospital of the Bagno to prepare 
an old galley-slave for death. The physicians had 
given up all hope to save him, so also had the clergy 
^ of the hospital. The latter found in the gray sinner 
\ a heretic who absolutely would not be converted, 
f I, at that time, was considered a learned man. The 
( captain of the galley, Mr. Delaubin, seemed to 
\ esteem this slave, and as he knew me personally, ho 
^ entreated me to care for the salvation of the soul of 
^ the hardened sinner. As little as I felt inclined to 
i lead an apostate back into the bosom of the church, 
yet I consented. My curiosity had been aroused 
because it was generally asserted that this heretic 
was completely possessed by the devil, worse than 
Calvin, and confounded the most skilled heathen- 
I converters. 

I 


32 


ALAMONTADA. 


“I went. Odd enough, thought I to myself on 
the way, and could not refrain from laughing; one 
Freethinker shall here convert the other. Had the 
pious captain of the galley known me better he 
would not hav insisted so. But so we carry on sad 
mummery in life. No one of all mortals, even if he 
were the wisest and most virtuous, has courage 
enough to go through life without a mask. 

“ I was led into the room of the sick galley-slave. 
There he sat, wrapped in an old cloak, with his face 
turned toward the open window, in the full sun- 
shine, as if to warm himself in it, and, at the same 
time, enjoy the pleasant view into the open air. He 
turned his head toward me. I shall not forget this 
pale, saintly face as long as I liv. Here was not the 
gloomy, staring look of the common criminal, or the 
shameless audacity of confirmed vice, and the dull 
remorse and dejection of punished but not improved 
wickedness; no, it was the calmness of an unembar- 
rassed, pure soul, the goodness of innocence, which 
spoke out of those large, beautiful eyes. The coun- 
tenance of the unfortunate, affected by every kind 
of weather and bleached by sickness, had, as much 
as it was the countenance of a sufferer, nevertheless 
something noble and winning in all its features. In 
the neck of the closely- shaven head a few gray hairs 
were yet visible, which to the head, even the head 
of a. criminal, lent a venerable aspect. Enough, I 
was at this sight strangely affected. So I had not 
expected to find this man. 

“ I approached him. ‘ Pardon me,’ said he, ‘ I can 
not show you my respects. You see my feet there 
stretched upon that straw ciisliion. They are al- 
ready swollen up to my knees.’ 1 stepped up to him 


ALAMONTADA. 


33 


and asked him his name. He called himself Ala- 
montada, named to me his birthplace, and at the 
same time, that he, in the prime of his years, had 
been condemned to the galley, and had served out 
his punishment within half a year. He had then 
been a galley-slave for nearly twenty-nine years. 

“‘Well for thee,’ said I to him; ‘then thou 
wilt soon be at liberty, thou wilt see again thy 
home, and canst the rest of thy days liv like an hon- 
est man.’ 

“ ‘ I shall not again see my home ! ’ said he, with 
quivering voice; ‘I hav no home in this world — they 
hav robbed me of it. I long for the quiet land of 
I the grave. I know it well, death is more friendly 
j with me than life. He will now not tarry so long as 
he has thus far tarried.’ 

I “ So talked the slave. I admit that the general 
dignity, the select language, and the soft voice, so 
full of significance, touched me just as much as it 
I embarrassed me. Everything convinced me that 
this one, cast out of human society, was none of the 
common kind of galley-slaves; that he formerly, at 
j least, must hav enjoyed a good education, the marks 
[ of which he had faithfully preserved, even in the so- 
[ ciety of outcasts, wherein he had spent almost the 
[ half of his life. 

S “‘Believest thou also,’ I continued, ‘belicvest 
I thou also, Alamontada, that thou wilt not liv to see 
I thy freedom ? ’ 

I “ ‘ I at least hope,’ he answered, ‘ that death will 
I free me from the burden of my days before the law 
\ frees me from these chains.’ 

I “‘And thou canst really think with such - reat 
tranquillity of death? Hast thou so used llic time 


34 


ALAMONTADA. 


of thy punishment that thou canst ho]>e to be fully 
reconciled to the Judge of the living? Behold, Ala- 
montada, Captain Delaubin has much compassion 
for thee. He believes himself that thou wilt num- 
ber only a few more days. I come, in reality, in- 
duced by him, to see thee, in order — ’ 

“ Alamontada interrupted me. ‘ The grace of our 
captain moves me deeply; aid your philanthropy, 
dear sir, I honor. But I pray you most humbly to 
entreat my lord to send no more clergymen, but to 
grant to my last hours the consolation of solitude. 
Shall and must I then be deprived even of this consola- 
tion? If it can serve your satisfaction, I declare 
once more, that I hav been prepared these three and 
twenty terrible years for the beautiful moment of 
my death; that I die without sorrow; that I do not 
tremble before the Judge of the dead. But can my 
petition not be granted, then I beg to wait until my 
last hour, when the eucharist and extreme unction 
may be administered.’ 

“ He said this with such heartfelt, entreating 
voice that I without hesitation gave my word to in- 
tercede for him. Among others I thereby involun- 
tarily expressed the thought that it were a duty to 
honor the wishes of the dying, and were he an Athe- 
ist, he should not be brought into heaven against his 
will. 

“‘You are a clerg5"man ? ’ said he. ‘Your mild- 
ness pleases me more than all the admonitions of 
your predecessors. You giv me rest, and make mo 
master of my most precious hours, the last ones. 
To a man like you, full of toleration, compassion, 
and understanding, the gratitude of even a galley- 
slave may not be disagreeable.’ 


ALäMONTADA. 


So 


I gave him to understand that I wished to he 
able to do more for his consolation, and that it de- 
served no thanks not to trouble him with theological 
speculations, if they were against his inclinations. 
I dropped these remarks in order to draw out this 
odd man still more. He looked at me with an ex- 
pression of astonishment, and exclaimed after a 
pause, ‘ Dear sir, you are an extraordinary man ! ’ 

“ ‘ Extraordinary ? ’ said I, ‘ I find nothing extra- 
ordinary in the fulfilment of the highest duties of 
every man.’ 

“ ‘ Even in that consists the extraordinary,’ said he. 

“I demanded of him to explain himself more 
fully. He seemed to hesitate, and asked with timid- 
ity if I would not be angry if he would speak frank- 
ly. I assured him that it would please me very 
much- Thereupon he said: 

“ ‘Dear sir, if the common man does his duty, ho 
verily does not deserve to be praised. But the man 
whom rank and dignity elevate above his fellow- 
men, hardening his heart and paralyzing his judg- 
ment, deserves admiration if he remains unpreju- 
diced and true to human nature. Therefore should 
we in born kings praise every virtue; in the soldier, 
sympathy for suffering; in the lawyer, justice; in 
the clergyman, respect for different opinions.’ 

“ I did not think that 1 ought to take offense at 
this judgment, expressed by an old galley-slave. 
And yet that man, through this and all else that he 
spoke, became more important to me. I penetrated 
him further. I was fortunate enough to gain his 
confidence. I learned that in his youth he had de- 
voted himself to the study of the sciences, and had 
l?een led ayp’ay from thenx to the galley-bench. 


36 


AI.MONTADA. 


Whatever his crime might hav been, he had atoned 
severely enough therefor. But, as much as curiosity 
burned in me, I thought it my duty to spare to the 
unfortilhate the memory of his transgressions, in the 
last moments of a sorrowful existence. 

“My conversation seemed to hav been agreeable 
to him. He begged me humbly to repeat my visit. 

‘ I am not worthy of this favor,’ said he, ‘ but your 
kind heart beats for the miserable. Even the slave 
is still a man and your brother. I am a disgraced 
one, and without property. Before my right arm 
was shot off, I could sometimes write. The leaves 
upon which I hav written my lamentations, under 
tears, hav been been left in my possession. These 
leaves I will bequeath to you as a legacy. Perhaps 
they will become dear to you.’ 

“ I complied with his wishes. I visited him daily. 
Our conversation soon turned to the loftiest objects 
of humanity. O you beloved ones ! this despised 
one soon raised himself before me to the rank of the 
most venerable mortals. He, whom I was to con- 
vert from his errors, converted me. His wisdom be- 
came in the nights of life my guiding star. His vir- 
tue sanctified me again. I never left the divine 
slave without being improved, and in the solitude of 
my room I noted down the conversations which we 
had held. Com ), I impart to you Alamontada’s con- 
versations. Thus I honor his memory in the most 
beautiful manner. What you hav heard from me so 
far consider as an introduction to all. The condition 
of your souls is the same that I brought with me to 
the dying slave. What he at that time spoke to 
mo consider it as if spoken to j'ou.” 

With these words Abbe Dillqn arose. Ww walked 


ALAMONTADA. 


37 


I 


in silence along the shore of the lake. The sun sank 
down, and shadows crept over the earth. Roderick 
; and I were gloomy. Dillon had broken the slender 
: reed upon which our spirit, thus far, had still leaned, 

in order not to perish in the pangs of anxious doubts. 
I We tottered without support, and clung tightly to 
I Dillon’s lofty, firm spirit, like feeble children to 
I their father. 

I When we had come into the abb6’s room, and 
I the candles had been lighted, he drew forth from 
I under his papers a note-book. We seated ourselvs, 
j and Dillon read. 

5 

I 


1, 

CHAPTER VI. 

[ “ Although I did not want to trouble the slave 

< with expounding theological questions, because 1 

S feared to hurt him, he himself turned the conversa- 

j tion toward that point. He spoke with warmth 

\ about religion. 

I “‘How,’ said I, ‘hast thou, then, also a religion, 
Alamontada ?’ ‘ Do you think,’ replied he, ‘ that 

I there is a man without religion ? Only the earliest 
f infancy and insanity may be without it ?’ 

! “ ‘ And what is thine, for thou art considered an 

I Atheist ?’ 

i “ ‘ I am an outcast from the society of my fellow- 
! brethren,’ answered Alamontada ; ‘ therefore it hurts 

I no one’s conscience to think and say every evil of 

I me. I hav resigned the friendship of my brothers, 

I therefore I do not dare any more to open my mouth 

I in my own justification. I belong to no one. Had 


38 


Al. AMON TA OA. 


I a joy, who might share it with me ? Aud my suf- 
ferings 1 hav courageously borne alone.’ 

“ He sank into a melancholy silence. Then he 
raised his eyes again to me and said: ‘ You ask after 
my religion. How shall I describe it to you ? It is 
that which the creator himself has revealed within 
me. The prejudices of the great mass, the immoral- 
ity of priests and monks, the contradictions of 
church doctrins with the unshakable truths of nature, 
awakened in former time my meditation. And this 
led me out of the bosom of the church into the arms 
of God.’ 

“‘And didst thou find thyself under all tribula- 
tions consoled by thy religion ?’ 

“‘Ah, dear sir, consoled? Yes. But for that I 
suffered no less. Like a friendly talisman religion 
keeps us above the waves in the shipwrecks of life, 
that we may not drown. But so rocked in the waves 
of misery, dear sir, one cannot smile, though heaven 
might be open before us, as it was before Saint 
Stephanus.’ 

“ ‘ I congratulate thee that thy faith hath at least 
helped thee so much. Far from attacking thy relig- 
ious convictions, as it really is my order, I wisli to 
become acquainted with them that I might, if it were 
possible, imbue every unfortunate with them.’ 

“ ‘ My religion, dear sir, every one knows. You 
find it in every quarter of the globe. All nations 
hav it, only with various ornaments and additions, 
which are not necessary with me. It is easier for me 
than any one else to hav it. I am an outcast who no 
longer bt longs to any nation, but still to humanity. 
Consequently I hav not the religion of a nation, but 
the religion of humanity, and no one persecutes me fo^ 


ALAMONTADA. 


89 


it. Also hav the nations never quarreled about re- 
ligion, but only about its ornaments and human ad- 
ditions. But be this as it may, well to those who 
died for it. Both were blessed in it.’ 

“ ‘ But how, if thou considerest thy belief the only 
; true one and doubtest no more, if thou art convinced 
that the religion of others be perhaps delusion and 
error, how canst thou then call them blessed ?’ 

“ ‘Because they were so. Ah, were I a man, like 
: others, and as I once was and had won the world’s 

i confidence and love ! Nevertheless I should hav 
feared the sin to attack the belief of others. The 
inhabitants of the earth liv in everlasting infancy. 
They are, without exception, children, and need the 
leading-strings and the guardian. Their reason 
[ always lies in the soft cradle of fancy, and the emo- 
tions stand about to rock it. ’Tis true, before them 
floats almighty nature and testifies with loud voice, 
There is a God ! ’Tis true, in their inmost heart 
/ they hav the sacred assurance of eternity, yet their 
self-reliance is too feeble. They tremble before 
; self-deception. They trust more in a stranger than 
; in a friend. They' are in need of revelation. Well, 

; then ! Every nation has its god-sent and prophet, 

' and every child trusts his father more than himself. 
Only few single individuals elevate themselvs. Only 
few separate ones raise themselvs out of the mass of 
' the millions ; they understand the testimony of natu re 

I and the assurance in their heart and the light of their 
mind as the guiding-star of humanity. These are the 
mature, the god-sent.’ 

“ ‘ But can there not,’ said I, ‘ come a time when 
the human race will step out of its infancy ?’ 

“ ‘ I doubt it.’ answered Alamontada. ‘ By the 


40 


ALAMONTADA. 


order of tilings, wliereby we shall eat our bread in 
the sweat of our brow, the best part of our life 
passes everywhere behind the plow, at the loom, in 
the barn, and at the helm of the sliip in the service 
of earthly wants. Only to a few has it been granted 
to dedicate their days to the sciences. There may 
come a century when finally the people will possess 
as their own the results of philosophy and natural 
sciences, the fruit of painful examinations in all 
fields of human knowledge; there may appear a cen- 
tury when even religion, in its quiet simplicity and 
freed from all sensual show, will be the religion of 
the people ; but never will the people be able to ex- 
amiu for themsel vs. They will not take the grand and 
simple doctrins and principles direct from the first 
source, but receive them with confidence in the wis- 
dom of the teacher; and as it will be then, so it is 
now. The people cling with faith to him who is to 
them an anointed one of higher knowledge with the 
faith which the child brings to his parents, the pa- 
tient to his physician. Gray prejudices will perish, 
but new ones will arise in their places. Men will 
become more skilled, more educated, more humane. 
They will one day shudder before the time of bar- 
barity in which we now liv, and, notwithstanding, 
will never step entirely out of the condition of in- 
fancy.’ 

“ ‘ I doubt,’ said I, ‘ if the human race, while it is 
training itself and rejoices in a higher degree of un- 
derstanding and tenderness, shall at the same time 
see less of misery.’ 

“ ‘Why not? Oh, verily, dear sir, among a re- 
fined people I never should hav spent the most beau- 
tifid half of my days in chains and in the dungeon. 


ALAMONTÄDA. 


41 


Do you not believe that with the progress of civili- 
zation of the natioris public welfare increases and 
misery diminishes ? So compare for a moment the 
civilized nations of our time with the barbarous 
hordes which stand only on the lowest step of cult- 
ure ; share for a moment with them the anxiety of 
superstition, the wildness of burning passion, the in- 
humanity of their wars, the cruelty of their clumsy 
justice, the bitter fruits of ignorance in every domain 
— compare the well-to-do European of our century 
with the thrifty man of the middle ages of our era. 
The development of the manifold abilities of human 
nature increases the enjoyments and pleasures of life. 
The destruction of hurtful prejudices, the continued 
conquests in the realms of science, diminish the 
number of evils, and giv to the soul gradually a 
greatness and power, with which it lifts itself above 
even unavoidable evils. 

“ ‘ Let yourself,’ continued Alamontada, ‘ not be 
misled by the stubbornness of poets and the whims 
of philosophers who in the refinement of the nations 
see only an increase of evil; and since in the world 
of reality nothing answers to their ideals of general 
happiness, they place them in the days of an- 
tiquity or of a better future — days which no 
one has ever seen, and which no one will ever liv to 
see. For it belongs to the weakness of mankind 
always to be surrounded by wishes; it belongs to 
every-day delusions to find the hours of the past and 
the future more charming than the present. The 
present is only a fleeting point of time; it is flown 
while we think of it, and another floats by before we 
expected it. Our emotions are divided among these 
atoms of time. Only in the recapitulation of a 


42 


ALMONTADA 


whole row of them we recognize their value. On 
that account are neither pleasures nor dangers so 
beautiful or terrible in the momentary present as 
when we await their coming ; and both again receive 
brighter colors as soon as they belong to the past. 
We praise the blissfulness of childish life; but if a 
god would giv us the choice perfectly free, who 
would want to be placed back there ? Let poets 
and philosophers who accuse the civilization of 
nations build them huts among the Cherokees or 
Finns, among the wandering Tartars or the Bedou- 
ins and Moors, and wait if they praise their lot.’ 

‘‘ So spoke Alamontada. I listened to him with 
pleasure; my interruptions served only to coax new 
thoughts out of him.” 


CHAPTER YIL 

W^hen I came to Alamontada one afternoon I 
found him in bed. An unusual gladness beamed in 
his countenance. He smiled at me. Never before 
had I seen him smile. 

‘“Thou seemest to feel well to-day,’ said I to him. 
‘ Oh, very well. The swelling of my feet extends to 
my hips, and the physician shook his head doubt- 
fully. He may, therefore, no longer keep the enemy 
away which he calls death and I call life.’ 

“ ‘ Diest thou then so willingly, Alamontada ?’ 

“ He looked at me at this question with an inde- 
scribable gentleness; in his looks was reflected the 
restrained fire of his heart. 


ALAilONTADA. 


43 


“ ‘ How ?’ spoke he. ‘ When the friendly moment 
appears that takes from my weary limbs the heavy 
iron chains and leads me out of the gloomy dungeon 
and out of the sad, strange realm back into the loved 
home, shall I then tremble ? Who on earth yet loves 
the forgotten Alamontada? No eye will melt in 
tears over his dead body. I leave no loved object 
behind which could make my return to my fatherly 
home difficult.’ 

‘‘ ‘And thy paternal home, where is that, Alamon- 
tada 

“ ‘ It is there where I shall again be with my own ; 
where I again, in the great family of the Almighty, 
appear as a child, not as a step-child, and where I am 
equal with all created beings. This globe also belongs 
to the dominion of the eternal ; but here I was cast 
out into misery, and no one knew me, no soul greeted 
me as brother soul.’ 

“ ‘ Knowest thou, then, Alamontada, knowest thou 
it certain that after the hour of death yet hours of life 
await thee ? Mayest thou with unshaken conviction 
close thine eyes? Thou it hast been who confessed 
to me that no revealed religion comforted thee. IIow 
mayest thou, without higher revelation, know thy 
lot after death ? Yet I will not with doubts disturb 
thy inmost peace.’ 

“‘Truly,’ answered Alamontada, ‘this peace no 
doubt can break. I myself stand there where those 
stood who to the childlike human race gave revela- 
tion without having received it. Man, in his perfec- 
tion, needs no supernatural vision in order to feel in 
the homelike universe at home. Only the blind 
must be guided by a strong hand; to him the street 
remains dark, although a thousand suns may shine.’ 


44 


AivAMONTADA. 


‘‘ ‘ But when is man in his perfection?’ asked I. 

“ ‘ As soon as he has equally trained all his facul- 
ties and knows how to value and use them rightly ! ’ 
replied Alamontada- ‘ He who would want to walk 
on his hands and work with his feet would justly bo 
called a fool. So likewise is he a fool who with his 
power of imagination would measure eternity ; or he 
who substitutes emotions for moral laws; or he who 
denies what has been because it has escaped his 
memory; or does not believe in a future because it 
has not yet been; or doubts a God, for whose exist- 
ence there are as many or as few proofs as for the 
existence of our own self. Powerful is man, and 
great and godlike in his own sphere of life. But the 
false direction, the erroneous use of his powen 
makes him infirm. He sometimes wants to hear with 
his eyes and see with his ears. That he cannot. 
Then he weeps over the misery of human existencf 
and accuses the world and its fotinder. Everywhere 
he misses truth, and yet he alone is to blame forthat.’ 

“ I felt struck with these words. T. disclosed my- 
self to the wise man without reserve; acquainted 
him with my disease, this fearful doubting, which 
destroyed all my peace. 

“ ‘ Do you doubt all,’ spoke he smiling, ‘ even that 
you doubt ? You find nowhere in the world cer- 
tainty, consequently also not therein that it is you 
who cannot find certainty ?’ 

“ ‘No!’ cried I; ‘that lam there I cannot deny 
without being insane ; that besides me {here arc 
other things is also certain. But what they arc, 
why I am— that I know net. 

“‘How do you know that you are? Who has 
revealed it to you ?’ 


ALAMONTABA. 


45 


“ ‘ I feel, I think, and upon that I conclude that 
something feels and thinks, and this something is 
myself. Something impresses me, independent of 
the workings of my imsgination; I, therefore, hav 
no cause to doubt the existence of other things. But 
those objects I do not know, only their workings 
upon my senses. Again, I cannot comprehend the 
connection between my soul and the outer world. I 
find, the longer I study nature, that the impressions 
produced upon me bj' objects without will by no 
means justify me to dciermin upon their nature, but 
that the nature of their impression is the result of 
my incomprehensible organization.’ 

“ ‘ Ah ! dear sir,’ said Alamontada, ‘ if man were 
not concerned about higher and more beautiful se- 
crets, the knowledge of the things surrounding him 
would only slightly occupy him. But with pleasure 
I will follow your thoughts. That which through 
my whole life afforded entertainment to my desolate 
hours shall also sweeten the last weeks, or days, or 
hours, of my existence. I agree with you that to me 
the causes of things, which I call world, dwell in 
secret darkness; that I really only liv in an imaginary 
world, which shapes all things after the law of my 
disposition. But also in this must I, after just these 
laws, distinguish the working cause from the effect. 
I, consequently, see the universe divided into two 
parts; a world full of phenomena, or impressions on 
me, and this alone it is that I know; another world 
full of working, in themselvs unknown causes, which 
I recognize through their effects ; to these belong 
myself, or, if you will, my soul, which itself pro- 
duces appearances. So I, it is true, of the immense 
clock-work of the universe see only the outside, only 


ALAMONTADA. 


U 

the dial, but dark and a riddle remains the interior 
and the lofty artist.’ 

“‘Thou speakest,’ said I, ‘thou speakest of causes 
and effects, but knowest thou also whether it is that 
way in the universe? ^!Vho vouches for that, that 
everything be not otherwise than thou art compelled 
to imagin it to thyself ? How, if the whole universe 
would be no more or no less than a necessary conse- 
quence of thy organization, as the rose is the neces- 
sary result of the inner construction of the rose-bush. 

“‘To that,’ replied my philosopher, ‘only one 
answer can be given : either will I make use of my 
power of intellect, and then I must think in obedi- 
ence to its laws, or I will not judge according to the 
dictation of my reason — will let something irrational 
take the lead of the rational, and then ends all in- 
vestigation, and insanity takes the place of it. The 
language of the latter I do not understand, as little 
as it understands itself. As long, therefore, as I am 
man, that is, so long as I hav reason, do I talk rea- 
sonable, and the doubt of insanity cannot move me. 
I talk only of the world as I hav it, not of that 
whereof I hav no proof, no trace, no presage, and 
what is nowhere for me, except in a freak of my 
fancy. 

“‘Enough; I know that I am, although insanity 
might doubt its own self. I know that other things 
independent of me work upon me. I am, and am 
not alone. I share the enjoyment of existence with 
millions of other beings. I recognize in these mill- 
ions beings created like myself, and call them and 
myself spirits, because they hav the power of free, 
independent action. I recognize them, like myself, 
onlv from their appearances in words and actions. 


ALAMONTADA. 


47 


Yet their nature is unknown to me. They belong to 
the first causes, to those powers which fill the worW 
with their results, though they remain secrets in 
themselvs. 

“ ‘ And why must they remain a secret in them- 
selvs ? ’ asked I. 

“ Upon this he answered : ‘ That question touches 
the horizon of our knowledg«^ I might well answer; 
just as all nature around us livs and works, and yet 
is without understanding of its own organization ; or 
just as the single thought springs forth from the hu- 
man mind, without being able to recognize its own 
nature, because it is not the origin of itself, but rath- 
er an outflow, or, as it were, a part of our own indi- 
viduality — so, ’tis true, the mind has consciousness, 
but likewise no perception and knowledge of the 
real constitution of its own nature, because it also is 
not the independent source of its own existence, but 
part or outflow of a higher being. A thought is from 
this higher being, which human tongues call the prime- 
val cause of all existence, or God. I might say that 
the limitless all of the spirits, beings, powers, things, 
is only a unit, an undivided whole, which, to be sure, 
to the senses or the human imaginativ faculties seems 
to be divisible, but in reality is not so. The soli- 
tary, this all, outside of which nothing else can 
possibly be thought of, because it in itself is all, has, 
because it is all, alone in the highest consciousness 
the understanding of itself. We other spirits, be- 
ings, powers, and things are issues of God, without 
understanding our inner nature, because otherwise 
we must be able to penetrate and understand the be- 
ing of God, who is our original being. I could tell 
you more. But would you understand me ? I, also, 


48 


ALAMOISITADA. 


onco impertinently or curiously attempted to leave 
the circle which nature had drawn around my activ- 
ity; but soon I felt the vanity of my undertaking. 
The first step to wisdom and contentment is to ac- 
knowledge the impossible; the second, not to wish 
the impossible. Since it now is foolish to wish the 
impossible, so must the sacrifice be light, for us to 
forever and entirely banish the thought thereof, and 
to be satisfied with what we hav. 

‘‘ ‘ And that which we possess in the realm of 
knowledge is sufficient for our contentment. While 
my spirit revels in the wonders of eternal nature, it 
recognizes itself as one of the nobler parts thereof. 
Nature remains; only the forms, the colors, the com- 
binations of things change ; but that which lies be- 
hind these forms and colors, and what produces these 
changeable phenomena does not cease. I can, 
through the power of fire, dissolve a palace into in- 
visible atoms ; but with that I hav only discontinued 
a relation of these small particles to one another, 
which formerly was called palace; the particles 
themselvs I hav not wiped out of the universe. The 
working, unknown powers, the things themselvs, re- 
main ; only different phenomena appear now, that is, 
they make a different impression upon my senses 
since they sustain another relation to me. 

“ ‘ Further I do not penetrate ; partly because I see 
everywhere the boundary of my knowledge, partly 
because I need for my contentment no more than I 
am permitted to know.’ 

“ ‘ I confess to thee,’ said I to Alamontada, ‘ thy 
philosophy is very easily satisfied. Mine, I am sorry 
to say, demands more. It searches for solid, indis- 
putable truth, and finds it nowhere. It seeks cer- 


ALAMONTADA. 49 

tainty about the most important affairs of human 
nature, and discovers only doubts far and near.’ 

‘ You are unhappy because you wish for more 
than you are able to accomplish, and foster desires 
whose passionate voices overpower the more gentle 
language of reason and the heart. But two ways 
only we can pursue. Either must we make use of 
our mental powers as we possess them, or we sur- 
render ourselvs wilfully to the oddest insanity. The 
latter happens if we, to use an already-employed 
illustration, demand of the ears that they see colors, 
of the eyes that they should listen to sounds. It 
happens when we doubt our freedom and yet hourly 
make different choices ; when we reject all belief and 
still daily act upon guesses; when we find content- 
ment in nothing but indisputable certainties, and 
yet in a world full of delusions become wiser even 
through delusions. So is such a philosopher (if I may 
call him a lover of wisdom who delights in everlast- 
ingly contradicting the laws of his inner being) an 
unhappy man. He accuses nature, and should only 
battle against his folly.’ 

“ ‘ But how dost thou explain this,’ I asked him, 
* that man becomes more inclined to doubt the more 
he extends his knowledge and purifies his ideas? 
One would think that researches and study would 
lead finally to truth, and truth to rest. Why is the 
contrary always the case ? Why are they the most 
contented, and, if thou wilt, the happiest, who know 
the least ? and why is the pang of constant doubt the 
reward of the activ researcher? Should this not 
throw suspicion upon the value of our knowledge 
and make us disgusted with the strife for higher 
training of ourselvs, since it tears our most beautiful 


ALAMOJfTADA, 


50 

liop^s, destroys our most sacred aimSy and with in- 
consolable night hides the Eden to which our long- 
ing aims? 

“Alamontada smiled gently and stretched bis 
arms upward, and his eyes glistened with a joyful 
ray. ‘Over my Eden,’ exclaimed he, ‘hangs no in- 
consolable night 1 I am, and am in the boundless, 
unexplored all; out of it nothing is lost. My being 
is one with the being of the universe. It is a primi- 
tiv power; out of it I came; the name is upon the 
tongue of all rational creatures; it breathes longing 
into every heart ; and to every reason it is given to 
think, to honor it. And that is God ! And the 
thought of God is the dim understanding of our own 
mysterious being, and the self-esteem of the most 
virtuous spirit for itself is an adoration of the prim- 
itiv source of all that exists.’ 

“ Alamontada had not lost my question. lie took it 
up again after a while. 

‘“Nothing seems to me more natural,’ said he, 
‘ than that man should sink deeper in doubts, the 
further he hurries after the trace of a truth shining 
from afar. Idle ignorance only believes everything, 
doubts nothing. He who breaks loose from it, dis- 
covers among ten venerable truths surely nine errors. 
Abashed by manifold self-deceptions, he becomes 
full of distrust. Nothing satisfies him any more 
except solid, indisputable certainty; he finds it no- 
where, for everywhere he can add, Under other cir- 
cumstances everything might be different. There- 
fore superstition and Infidelity mix immediately 
together. The chair of St. Peter at Rome bore the 
first Atheists of Christendom. Between night and 


ALAMONTADA. ‘ Öl 

day lies twilight ; between error and wisdom the 
tormenting twilight of doubt.’ 

“ ‘ But why languish so many in this fog, and do 
not find their way out into the light?’ asked I be- 
tween. 

“ ‘ Perhaps,’ said he, ‘ many a one lacks courage; 
he remains standing, instead of going forward in a 
straight direction; another, who loves the dreams of 
his childhood, shudders before the uncommon form 
of truth, and returns in old age whence he came. 
I knew in my youth many a penitent Atheist. 

“ ‘ Still others seek the light by false ways, that is, 
instead of marching onward they turn about in the 
circle of their doubts. They want proof of the ex- 
istence of God and the immortality of the soul. In 
order to make this discovery they begin vain exam- 
inations about the nature of things, of the powers of 
which we perceive only the result, not the powers 
themselvs. They want to find out what God is in 
himself, and what the soul is in itself, whilst they in 
consequence of their nature can perceive only the 
phenomena of them. After fruitless efforts they 
stand in the twilight again in their old place, and 
despair to escape from the labyrinth. 

“ ‘ Others again choose the way of similitude of 
things ; they explain to themselvs how, under certain 
conditions in the world of bodies, the things work. 
The deeper they penetrate into the secrets of nature, 
the more they resolve the bodies into their primitiv ele- 
ments, the simpler they find the code of the universe, 
after which everything existing works upon the other, 
attracts the other, disunites and mechanically or 
chemically forms new things. That man thinks, per- 
ceives, and wills, and acts, that he can compute the 


62 


ALAMONTADA. 


course of circumrotation of the heavenly bodies and 
understands the laws of fermenting nature, these also 
they consider to be the result of his organization, as 
blossom and fruit are the natural result of the organi- 
zation of the plant. Destroy the root of the plant, 
cry they, and blossom and fruit fall. So with man’s 
spirit. What hav they taught us about it? They 
explain from unknown things, that we shall never un- 
derstand, the unknown, which we would like to 
know. For the powers which produce those phenom- 
ena that we call bodies remain a riddle. Or they want 
from phenomena to explain a something and its fate, 
which is itself neither phenomenon nor body, but 
pure working power; I mean the human mind. They, 
in fine, make the body the father of the mind, that 
which was put together for the thought, the origin 
of the simple, the changeable the basis of the un- 
changeable, that which is unconscious of itself, the 
creator of the self-conscious ; in short, man a clock- 
work, an automaton, and preach for glory’s sake an 
inversion of all that is reasonable, which they would 
not in earnest like to believe. 

“ ‘ But with the greateit number the disease of 
doubt probably originates from the wrong use of 
their mental faculties in treating this great subject. 
They want to accomplish with their fancy that which 
reason only is capable to do. They want to repre- 
sent by pictures that which can only be imagined, as 
also mathematical points and l-ines can only be in im- 
agination. While reason works, the fancy, unnoticed, 
shoves pictures under the clear ideas, and the de- 
ceived philosopher takes the one for the other, and 
despairs at the last to succeed in his cause. That is 
the reason that this disease is found mostly among 


ALAMONTADA. 


53 


young men of your age, my dear abbe, where one 
steps from the play-ground of fancy into the work- 
shop of understanding, loving both and suffering 
both to work, and where then the first works of our 
self-acting become strange, though sometimes beau- 
tiful deformities.’ ” 

“ Now, that hits you both ! ” said Dillon smiling. 

Roderick pressed his hand and said: “The old 
slave is right in many things. But one must hear his 
words two or three time in order to fully fathom 
their meaning.” 

“ I desire greatly,” said I, “ to become acquainted 
with the man’s own convictions, in order to learn 
whether they will crowd out or confirm my own.” 

“ Be it so !” answered Dillon. “ Let us at some 
other time read Alamontada’s conversations as noted 
down by me, and now to the point. We shall now 
hear from him, what he thinks of his spirit and its 
fate, and why we should think thus and not other- 
wise.” 

Dillon skipped a few books, drew forth one of 
the last ones, and read. 


CHAPTER VIII. 

“ ‘ And which way did’st thou choose, Alamontada, 
to lead thee out of the dark regions of doubt into 
the realms of light?’ I asked him one day. 

“ ‘ I also,’ answered he, ‘ was once tortured by 
the frightful uncertainty about the worth of my life 
and my future fate. To whom hav not tliese things, 
sooner or later, been of importance? But only two 


64 


ALAMONTADA, 


ways I always found which could lead me to some 
knowledge of these matters— the way of mere expe- 
rience and the way of self-acting reason. 

“‘For a long time the way of experience seemed 
to me the safer. I3ut soon I found that my objects 
lay beyond the reach of human experience; that I 
never, in the present conditions and with the present 
instruments of my soul, could comprehend the super- 
natural causes of things or phenomena which sur- 
rounded me; that I would strive in vain to make ex- 
periences in a world for which no wings had been 
given mo; that I, ’tis true, was myself a part of 
this dark world of powers and causes, but without 
sense of perception for it, only with sense of percep- 
tion for its workings. 

“ ‘ So there remained to me only the way of rea- 
son. I felt vividly that I, speaking of convictions, 
was compelled to observe the laws of reason. What 
contradicted them could not convince me. I notice* I 
that all mankind, without agreement, without evt r 
having seen each other, at all times, in all zones, 
possessed the same laws of reason as myself, and 
that they only deviated from me in the application 
of them. I noticed that the new-born child began 
to think and act in these laws just as soon as it was, 
through a chain of own-experiences and their com- 
parison with one another, enabled to distinguish it- 
self from other objects. 1 found the same also to be 
true with the worn-out, aged man, whose power of 
imagination was exhausted, whose memory was 
blighted. Until the life of his body became extinct 
the laws of his thinking retained their supremacy, 
although through the lameness of his sensual organs, 
as, for instance, if he, through the loss of memory. 


ALAMONTADA- 


55 


l)ecaine childish, he was no longer able to value 
rightly the objects about him, and to apply rightly 
the laws of his individuality, 

I “ ‘ If I think and act in these laws, everything be- 
I fore me develops itself in pure harmony. If I at- 
tempt; to escape their commands, all crumbles to- 
gether into a confused chaos ; I stagger among con- 
tradiction; I am insane. 

“‘The organization of my individuality compels 
me to think all as cause or effect. I recognize my- 
self as the cause of my thoughts, wishes, and acts. 
I cannot help attribute a primitiv cause to the exist- 
ence of the world of powers which surround me, of 
which I perceive only their workings u]X)n me, not 
the powers tbemselvs. ^ven the Atheist does not 
deny this away. He calls the secret, co-working 
powei-s of nature primitiv cause of all those phenom- 
ena that float about us- He give to them eternity, 
which others ascribe to their God, and puts the 
strength of his doubts against the existence of God, 
or his proof for the sulSciency of the secret natural 
powers for demonstration of the world, in our non- 
ac<^uaintance with them. We know it too little ia 
order to judge about it rightly, says he. Well, I am 
of his opinion. He also has accepted a highest se- 
cret cause of the univei-se. It is his god. But he 
reserves his powers for beings working uncon- 
sciousl}", according to laws. Nature, says he, so 
ci^ated from eternity, brought forth since eternity, 
without being conscious thereof, the phenomena and 
their changes. So then man alone would be the 
only rational being, because he has consciousness 
of life. So then nature would be a god, who pro- 
duced nobler things than he is himself. The uni- 


56 


ALAMONTADA. 


verse would be a dead machine, which does not 
know itself, but brings forth beings which would 
deserve to be called gods, because they alone really 
liv and observe the creation and changes of nature, 
or the god unconscious of himself. The thought 
shocks me. So long as I am a rational being, I can- 
not adhere to it. 

“ ‘Does reason compel me to accept a primordial 
being, so it compels me, at the same time, not to 
imagin it more imperfect than I am myself. This 
wonderful harmony in the whole universe, these 
laws of the secret powers of nature, which govern 
the immeasurable all, are so lofty, as no thought at 
first could be thought by me, and ever been thought 
by mortals. I imagin from this a power similar to 
myself, similar in regard to self-acting and conscious- 
ness. And so deep as a single atom lies under the 
organization of the universe, just so deep lies man, 
with his wisdom and power, under the wisdom and 
power of the supreme being. 

“ ‘ Yea, dear sir, he who cannot break the laws of 
reason, cannot drive out of the universe the all-ar- 
ranging, ruling, all-animating, primitiv being, into 
the realm of non-existence. Man stands, on account 
of his consciousness and lofty qualities, upon a high 
round in the scale of things. And a proof of his 
loftiness is that by his reason he is compelled to 
think God. He sees in God himself, and again, 
within himself the reflection of the sacred primitiv 
being. 

“‘Mayan egotistical, merely school-philosopher, 
more in order to shine than to imbue convictions, 
confuse tlie understanding, commence quarrels, and 
imagin himself great, to hav proved there is no God? 


ALAMONTADA. 


67 


Tbe outcry of all nature reechoes eternally in his 
breast. 

“ ‘ God is. I can entangle myself, intoxicate my- 
self with fancies, and always I return to the thought, 
God is ! The voice of reason penetrates all soph- 
istry. All nations, all ages of the world, one un- 
taught by the other, pronounce the name of the god- 
head. Only different must the human mind imaglu 
the greatness of God, because the degrees of its edu- 
cation were different. The Japanese and the Chris- 
tian, the Jew and the Siamese, the Mussulman and 
the negro — all bow worshiping before him whoso 
picture, in the brighter or more obscure mirror of 
their imagination, lioats clearer or more confusedly. 

“‘What is demanded of me? Shall I doubt the 
existence of the eternal, primitiv spirit? Then you 
wish that I should doubt even the existence of all 
things, the magnificence, wisdom, and holiness in the 
universe, or, rather, believe that that which has given 
us hearing, sight, and understanding could itself not 
hear, see, and understand. Shall I doubt the eternal 
truthfulness of the principles of reason? Then you 
would that I should prefer contradiction to the apree- 
ment of my knowledge; I should prefer insanity to 
truth; doubt my own doubts; stagger from nonsense 
to nonsense. Remarkable it is, that all skeptics in 
ordinary life thought and acted as reasonable as 
others; only in the study-room they became con- 
fused. Their best works are masterpieces of keen- 
sensed insanity. 

“‘All that one can say, looking at the wonderful 
universe and the scrupulously computed linking of 
thing«, is, I cannot comprehend it ! Poor mTii, liow 
mayest thou wish it even? If thou dosccndesi in thy 


58 


ALAMONTADA. 


shafts thousands of feet below the ground in order 
to watch the working of subterranean nature, where 
she, in her dark, rocky chambers, boils the metals, 
begets rivers, and prepares volcanic eruptions, ah I 
then thou hast hardly scratched the thin skin of our 
itLmense globe. Its gigantic intestins thou hast not 
seen. If thine eye, armed with telescope, roameth 
through the wide realm of skies and measureth the 
heavenly bodies as they untiringly and harmoniously 
circle around each other; if thou in the immense 
distance disco verest a new world, the existence of 
which no mortal being else imagined, and for the 
distance of which every earthly measure becometh 
too small, what hast thou ? O thou microscopical, 
invisible being, thou tremblest before the greatness 
of the water-drop in which thou livest, and prophe- 
siest, shuddering, the possibility of a second and 
third one, although thine own appeareth to be im- 
measurable. Thou knowest nothing of the rushing, 
eternal ocean, the depth of which hath no bottom, 
the area of which no shores. 

“‘And yet the spiteful, haughty little worm in its 
drop philosophizes about the immeasurable and de- 
nies what it does not comprehend. The cause cannot 
be at the same time its effect, the comprehending not 
at the same time the comprehended. 

“ ‘A wisdom speaks to me from all quarters of the 
universe, before whose greatness all measure ceases. 
We are in our knowledge so scanty, so poor, that we 
strive in vain after a worthier representation of the 
most high. The perception of him by the wisest 
upon the earth is always a man-god. But as to us 
children, even this representation is gratifying; so 
let us keep the faint picture of the invisible father 


A.LAMO]STADA. 


59 


tintil he once unveils himself, he whose veil is the 
eky, and the flying heavenly bodies therein the atom 
in the sunbeam.’ ” 


CHAPTER IX. 

“I stepped,” continued Abb4 Dillon, *‘to the 
couch of the unfortunate philosopher, pressed with 
emotion his hard hand, and sa d, ‘Thou art right, 
Alamontada. All that even the severest doubter 
can say about this grand object is, at the highest, I can- 
not comprehend it. It is impossible to giv a visible 
proof either against or for it. I feel it with thee, 
Alamontada, we are without wings for the superna- 
tural world. But to attempt to deny God out of the 
eternal, endless, magnificent universe is the most ec- 
centric arrogance of a dreamer, to whom was given 
more school-wit than mother-wit. The human 
mind, compelled through the laws of its being, must 
believe in a supreme beiug, although the mind cannot 
perceive it with its senses, cannot mathematically 
demonstrate it. Were God sensually visible, then 
he would be finite, would be dust, not God. This 
belief is so united and one with reason that to de- 
stroy it would mean to ruin reason. This all ages of 
the world felt. No teacher of nations and no peo- 
ple on earth ever spoke, I know God ! but in all 
tongues ijt is, I believe in God !’ 

“‘And this belief,’ . continued Alamontada, ‘is 
more than an ordinary taking a cause to be true for 
diverse reasons — yea, is far more than a knowledge 
at which we arrive by means pf con- 


60 


ALAMONTADA. 


elusions, and external observations. It is a naturally 
needed obligation, one and the same existence with 
it, the unchangeable basis of all higher knowledge, 
without which no union and unriddling of all that 
which is known were possible. J ust as every mortal is 
first brought, through observations and conclusions, 
to clearness of his own consciousness and convictions, 
that he really exists and livs, so he reaches through 
observations and conclusions a consciousness of the 
existence of God. But he has had life, before he 
could form conclusions, and the idea of God ho pos- 
sessed before it became clear to him through life and 
experience. We find it with the nations of all zones, 
and earlier with them than all other knowledge and 
art of life. It is nothing arbitrary, nothing invented, 
nothing traditional ; it is — how shall I express it to 
you in our hard, unwieldly, poor, human speech? — 
it is the godlike, out of which we are. We are at- 
oms of the divine being, I might say, which can 
never lose or deny their origin and their share in the 
eternal primitiv being. And this belief, inseparable 
from mankind, which is, in reality, no belief, but 
something more than that, for in it is founded, at 
the same time, the indestructible value of our spirit.’ ” 
At these words, Roderick interrupted the abb4. 
“ There ran a strange thought through Alamontada’s 
speech,” exclaimed he. “He spoke of the self-reve- 
lation of the supreme being in our reason. I confess 
that it would hav contributed much to the tranquil- 
ization of man, and would hav destroyed forever all 
doubts, if God in some way had revealed himself to 
man in this world, and not alone in reason. It is 
difficult for me to ex[)ress tliis thought or wisli riglu 
clearly, But I want to say about this muefi^ that 


ALAMONTADA. 


61 


the kind of divine revelation of which Alamontidu 
speaks is by far not so evident as many another 
would be.” 

Abbe Dillon smiled, laid his book down before 
him, and spoke: “For the part which we hav been 
created to act here below ; on the point, upon which 
we stand in the linking of beings; with the instru- 
ments of knowledge with which we, as beings that are 
called men, hav been equipped, no other self-revela- 
tion of the divinity is possible than in the spirit. 
With my outer senses, with eyes, ears, feeling, smell, 
and taste, I can only perceive the sensual. But the 
supernatural, spiritual, can only be touched by the 
supernatural spirit. What other revelation couhlst 
thou thyself invent that would be elevated above all 
doubts? A direct embassador of the godlead to the 
human race, who would hav preached to us its exist- 
ence and proved it by miracles? Almost every na- 
tion boasts to hav had these embassadors; they lived 
and taught a few years and doubts followed their 
embassy and their miracles. The Chinaman believes 
in Fohi, the Hindoo in Brahma, the Jew in Moses, 
the Turk in his Prophet. But we, dear Roderick, 
doubt the heavenly mission of all. If to-day the 
dead should burst their vaults and preach revelation, 
would we believe them? We would see in this res- 
urrection only something unusual. We would not 
look upon it as a proof of their divine mission and 
the truthfulness of their words, but as a proof of 
our hitherto ignorance about the course of nature. 
Every truth bears the power to convince in its own 
bosom, not in things outside of itself. If I we?e to 
attempt to prove to thee that the circle while it is 
round is at the same time square, and that two times 


62 


AL AMON T ADA. 


two are seven, thou wouldst laugh. If I now, to 
prove the correctness of my words, would let the 
stream run up hill and the sun stagger about in the 
sky, so wouldst thou on that account not be con- 
vinced of the truth of those propositions, but say, 
These strange phenomena of nature are proof that 
we do not yet know the laws of nature and their 
powers. 

“ Would, therefore, God reveal himself to the hu- 
man race, that is, communicate to it, God is ! then 
it could not be done through influences upon the 
senses ; it must be done through working upon the 
spirit. This working must last not only like that of 
a prophet, for a few years, but must endure forever; 
not only extend itself to a number of chosen believ- 
ers, but over all humanity without exception. 
Friend, this revelation, this only possible, we hav. 
God’s eternal magnificence shines through the being of 
our spirit because we are of divine origin; and with 
the consciousness of our earthly life the conscious- 
ness of an immortal life becomes clear. We know 
not whence comes the light within us, for it is not 
taken from the outer world, but it has arisen within 
us, from an unexplorable something, which is the 
basis of all that is. God is, because I am; I am, 
because God is. That is no guessing, no desire, no 
belief ; no, it is an unchangeable being, and is be- 
cause it is, and through the mere existence proves its 
being. It lies deeper than all forms of imagination 
and thinking, so deep as the consciousness of our- 
selvs within us. It is not in itself mere imagination, 
but state. For that reason are the measures of pos- 
sibility and probability inapplicable. There is a 
God ! Does not this grand revealed word speak 


ALAilONTAJJÄ. 


m 


through the oldest document of humanity, and 
through the youngest nation of the world, which has 
no knowledge of it ? ” 

Dillon’s speech moved me also with strange pow- 
er. In Roderick’s eye sparkled the dew of a tear. 
We spread out our arms, embraced the aged man, 
kissed his cheeks, and cried, “ There is a God ! ” 

A light evening breeze floated over the flowers in 
the garden through the open window, cooling our 
glowing temples. The moon enveloped the earth 
in her magic light, and millions of suns sparkled in 
star-constellations in the heavens. 


CHAPTER X. 

After a little while Abbe Dillon took the book 
which he had laid down, and read: 

“ ‘ And so,’ exclaimed Alamontada, ‘it is enough! 
What else do I want? There is a God, the highest 
goodness, the highest power, it is no willess, dead, 
mechanical being, for else would I, who am equipped 
with consciousness and power of choice, be greaU r 
than God! I am of this supreme being full of sanc- 
tity and goodness. I am of his race! More I med 
not for my quietude. I want to die; death does not 
make me tremble. Can I then perish? Can that 
which is become nothing? Nothing is a matter of 
thought, not anything objectiv, working, being, and 
existing. Can a mere thought become a' present ob- 
ject? Are powers which produce changeable ]>he- 
nomena destructible? Then the universe would be 
dcstructiblg; then God himself would be destruct* 


64 


ALAMONTADA. 


il)lü. What insanity! Death is separation of spirit 
from certain natural forces with which it was united, 
which we call bodies. The spirit from God irnagins 
its origin. It is in God. Thither it is driven by 
longing, always from the finite to the infinit, from 
the changeable into the eternal. This longing to be 
united again with that to which our nature feels 
itself more closely related than to powers uncon- 
scious of themselves, this longing after perfection 
is no invention, no childish, arbitrary desire, but 
attraction of the like by the like in the universe from 
necessity of natural law, just as the magnet must 
attract the iron that is related, to it. This longing 
livs in all mortals; it only speaks different lan- 
guage when it names heaven or hell Elysium or 
Tartarus. This longing proves to me nothing but 
that it is. The indestructibleness of the divine be- 
ing is a guaran'y for the indestmctibleness of our 
spirit. Truly everywhere in nature I see the realm 
of form change, but I am not aware that that which 
is moving within them or the cause that produces 
them ceases. I see, it is true, everywhere in nature 
phenomena change themselvs, but not the powers 
which are hidden within them and cause them. Why 
should I now mock my belief in a God, and fancy to 
myself that vainly this longing had been planted in 
my heart, and that the law, which points to eternity 
in vain in my reason ! Why should I now subtilize 
about the realm of primitiv powers, veiled by its 
own effects, since I can never understand it, and con- 
sequently can never prove that that power which I 
call “myself” would cease existence when tliis form 
of my body falls apart ? Why should I believe that 
that lifeless power wliich works out a phenomenon 


AI^ MONT A DA. 


65 


that I call an atom, why should I believe that it was 
from the beginning of all things and will exist for 
eternity, and on the contrary, the power which I 
call myself, which produces the loftiest results, soon 
ends ? 

‘‘ ‘ It was ever an odd mistake by the book-learned 
that they from information drawn from the nature of 
the human spirit and the alternate impression of the 
soul and body, fancied to be able to arrive at proof 
for or against immortality. These wise philosophers 
treated the soul somewhat like a building, of whose 
longer or shorter durability they would be able to 
judge from the manner in which the different mate- 
rials were put together, or the quality of these mate- 
rials. All those efforts have remaiijied in vain up to 
to-day, because they were thoughtless and childish; 
the nature of the soul by itself, as well as the being 
of the body by itself, is unrecognizable because 
both (soul and body) are observable only in their 
phenomena. But there is wanting in us as long as 
we are human beings an eye for the dark world of 
things proper. It is, consequently, equally foolish 
to draw proofs for the destructibleness or indestruct- 
ibleness of the human mind out of that which is unex- 
plorable. All experience forsakes us in this matter 
because we never hav experience of the primitiv 
powers, but only of their workings through the in- 
struments of the mind upon the mind.’ 

“ ‘ Really, my dear Almontada,’ said I, ‘ these at- 
tempts I hav long since despised as vain. Mean- 
while I will not conceal from thee that the other 
day a passage in a book startled me very much, 
where just this affair is spoken of, and the author 
says, “ I find everywhere where the race of things 


> I. A MOQ TADA. 


6’J 

continue that the individuals perish.” For me there 
lies some truth in that. Nature, unconcerned about 
the preservation of the individual, cares only foi the 
continuance of the species, and this is sufficient for 
the duration of the order of the world. Nature 
does not care whether myriads of insects perish in a 
day as if they never had been within the domain of 
creation, but their genus, their species remains.’ 

‘ Genus ?’ cried Alamontada, ‘ spe sies ? Are there 
in the realm of beings proper genera and species? 
Do you not talk of bodies, of the sensual, that is, of 
the workings of the powers? Very well, there are 
genera and species; there the single parts dissolve 
again and only the fundamental species, remain. 

‘ It is not improbable that in the realm of pow- 
ers higher and lower degrees of orders exist* Their 
changeable unitings and separations among them- 
eelvs caused the change of appearances. But each 
of the primitiv powers obeys, in its uniting with or 
separation from others, its own eternal law. For that 
reason is found, in the motley play of phenomena, a 
perfect uniformity and regularity. A principal power, 
however, seems to unite subordinate things with 
each other to that which we call genus and species; 
and this principal power works unceasingly through 
eternity; it is the thread that, untorn and indestruct- 
ible, spins itself on through the magnificent net- work 
of things. It appears in the germ of the plant, 
unites itself there, after its own laws, with other 
matters, so forms, after its own law, the palm and 
the olive-tree, the grass blade, and the moss, and 
thus causes to appear what we by natural bodies, by 
stones, plants, and animals call genus and species. 
The subordinate powers again separate, after their 


ALAMONTADA. 


67 


peculiar laws, from it, and then happens what we 
term death. But these powers, having entered other 
germs, begin their play of life over. This continues 
into eternity. Therefore we say the race and species 
last, but the individuals perish. 

“ ‘Also the human race belongs hither. Here also 
is a fundamental and principal power for the eternal 
formation and continuation of the race, as with the 
plant, as with the animal. But just as the plant 
stands higher in order through the power of life 
within it than the stone, and the animal stands 
higher through the sensitiv, observing soul dwelling 
withing . it than the plant, so man stands higher 
through his conscious, world-penetrating spirit than 
the united animal kingdom. 

“ ‘ The soul of man is one of the primitiv powers of 
the universe, but vastly different from all that unite 
themselvs with him, in order to become his tools, 
that is, to form for him a body. He recognizes him- 
self in his deviation from them. He possesses the 
feeling of his personality. 

“ ‘ When the individuals of the world of bodies 
disappear, when the stone decays, the plant withers, 
the animal dies, then return the powers which pro- 
duced the appearance of the individual into the im- 
mense crucible of the universe, from which they 
emerged and become useful in new connections. 
That is the inner life of the world. It remains 
eternally the same. Therein is no degree of en- 
nobling, no progress in perfectdon; stone, animal, 
plant, as one has seen them thousands of years ago, 
are still seen to-day. Quite otherwise it is with the 
spirit of man.’ 

“‘Why otherwise?’ I interrupted Alamontctda’s 


68 


ALAMONTADA. 


speech. ‘When the separate spirit individuals, 
after the death of the body, also would flow back to 
the universal power out of which they came, and 
desolve themselvs therein ? So here also the spirit- 
ual individuals would disappear, while the genus, the 
species, the generally diffused power of thinking 
would remain.’ 

“ ‘And if that were,’ replied Alamontada, gently 
smiling, ‘ should I complain about that ? This uni- 
versally diffused, world-penetrating, conscious po ver 
of sacred will, which animates and moves the uni- 
verse, as the human spirit the body that envelops it, 
that is divinity. I go back to the father, to the 
primitiv source of the spirits. But when this power 
within us, which we call spirit, is just as inde- 
structible as God himself, then also his consciousness, 
his world-penetration, his holy will, cannot cease, 
whereby it even distinguishes itself from all other 
forces of nature and elevates itself above all, 
whereby it is just what it is. 

“‘But who may conceive a measure for the im- 
mensity of beings ? Who surveys the linking of the 
divine powers and forces in the shoreless all of that 
which is ? Who counts the steps of the throne of 
divine majesty ? Ah, dear sir, our spirit floats im- 
mensely high over myriads of other beings, but to 
God there are new myriads above us, and we stand 
very low. 

W^hat we are, that we knowj we are conscious, 
thinking, world and God-knowing powers, full of 
holy will, full of endless longing to be eternal, and 
with the liviiig feeling of the i)ersonal, in itself com- 
plete independence. What we may be, that we im- 
agin. All forces of nature remain the same; not so 


ALAMONTADA. 


69 


the spirits. These advance from experience to ex- 
perience, from the noble to the nobler, from the per- 
fect to the more perfect, and change the globe under 
our feet. Humanity of to-day is, through the inher- 
itance of past ages, a more perfect one than the hu- 
manity of gray antiquity. History teaches that. In 
that the spirits differ from all the rest of the natural 
powers. What we shall be, there even the imagina- 
tion is silent. Great is Godj holiness and love his 
ruling; wonder and magnificence his realm; eternity 
his life. And we are in God, we are his children, 
we are indestructible, like himself. What else is 
needed for our consolation ? 

“‘Yes, I am!’ said Alamontada, and he looked 
with quiet blessedness toward heaven; ‘lam! That 
is sufficient for me. I am ! This small word em- 
braces eternity; for all that is is, and all that exists 
is eternal, because of God.’ ” 


CHAPTER XI. 

Here the abb6 was silent again. While 'v^e medi- 
tated upon the last words of Alamontada he turned 
the leaves in the book. He finally found the soiight- 
for passage, and said, “Hear, my dear friends, yet 
the last for to-day, and once for me, and perhaps, 
for you now, the most important of all that that ven- 
erable slave spoke.” 

“ Ah ! ” cried the tender Roderick with emotion, 
“ is that possible ? A slave ! — a galley-slave ! How 
could so much wisdom be found in him, or rather, 
how could a man of such insight, of such lofty prin- 


70 


ALAMONTADA. 


ciples, err eo deeply that he was forged to the beuch 
of the greatest criminals for life ? It is incompre- 
hensible ! ” 

“ To-morrow you shall learn this also,” said Dillon, 
“how a strange chain of circumstances could so 
deeply ruin the good Alamontada. Behold, beloved 
ones, I honor his memory, like the memory of a 
saint. He has written a diary of his unfortunate 
life ; out of this I afterward put his biography to- 
gether, as well as from what he verbally has related 
to me about it. He left me this diary and his little 
writings, written mostly on the ship or on the hot 
shores of Africa, as a bequest. But I was not yet 
satisfied with that. I wanted to become the pos- 
sessor of his chain. I received it. A skilled master 
also painted his picture for me.” 

“ His picture ! ” exclaimed Roderick, “ and that 
you hav never yet shown us. Truly, he is one of the 
most noble among men. I conjure you, dear abb6, 
show me his portrait ! ” 

Dillon arose. We took the candles and followed 
our friend through several rooms into the library, 
which was, at the same time, his study-room. He 
stepped before a glass case and opened the door. 

There hung Alamontada’s picture, and around it a 
heavy iron chain. 

“ This chain,” said Dillon, “ serves my saint instead 
of a wreath of glory.” 

“Is it possible?” cried Roderick, with meist eye 
and gently quivering voice; “is it then possible that 
a man like this had to bear that unfortunate fetter? 
What nobility, what admirable tranquillity of dis- 
position, in these features ! ” 

Roderick was right. Here was not the hidden 


ALAJMONTADA. 


71 


gloominess, withdrawing into one’s self, the rough, 
the audacious, which commonly marks the faces of 
low, mean criminals. It was the countenance of a 
sufferer, full of unspeakable highness and power. 
Out of the sickly, pale features; out of the languid 
lines around the closed lips; out of the slight incli- 
nation of the head toward the shoulder; out of the 
forehead full of wrinkles, around which waved thin 
hair, turned gray altogether too early by heavy 
grief, one recognized the nameless deep sorrow, and 
the thousand manifold sufferings, which must, in a 
terrible row of yeai'S, gradually kill this noble man. 
But the firm and yet so kind-hearted look of the 
eyes revealed again a character wherein calmness 
dwelt, while storms raged without; a spirit mighty 
through joyful consciousness, that could smile at the 
pains of its inclosure, and forgiv the vultures of 
Prometheus while they tore at his heart. 

We stood long before the attractiv painting. It 
seemed to us as if the sufferer’s spirit floated over * 
us. Melancholy took possession of our hearts. Dil- 
lon laid his hand upon the chain, and, looking up- 
ward, sighed; 

“ It was an earthly angel ! He was innocent and 
bore undeserved suffering. Ah ! and how he bore it I 
Alamontada, one day I will die, like thee — would I 
might do so with the high sense of virtue, like thy- 
self!” 

After a while Dillon led us back into the former 
room. 

“It grows late^ beloved,” said he. “To-morrow 
we shall enjoy the history of the remarkable man. 
But yet, I promised to impart to you out of our con- 
versations, one of Alamontada’s most important 


72 


ALAMONTADA. 


tnoughts. Collect once more your attention. It is 
tlie loftiest thought that mortal, after the thought, 
“ God ” can think. As often as it enters my soul, 
my soul feels its highness, its innate dignity. It 
feels everything earthly leave it, and learns, discon- 
nected with all parts of the universe, in solitude, be- 
longing only to itself, to recognize its high independ- 
ence, and to imagin its destiny dawning in far dis- 
tances.” 

We seated ourselvs again, as before. Then the 
abb4 took the papers and read. 


CHAPTER XIL 

“The longer I conversed with Alamontada the 
more venerable he appeared to me. He had become 
my teacher, I, his pupil. I, sent by Captain Delau- 
bint to lead him back to religion — he had become my 
converter. I felt my reason satisfied again within 
itself, and my doubts reconciled with one another. 
I was convinced that I, heretofore, had not been 
thinking, but dreaming; that I endeavored to picture 
in my fancy objects which are without connection 
with experience and the sensual world, objects which 
only want to be touched by the glances of reason ; 
that all my unbelief originated only therein, that I 
would philosophize with my power of imagination, 
and, from the nature of the divinity or from the nature 
and possibility of eternal being, would create, as it 
were, a picture-like representation, as one is accus- 
tomed to hav them of sensual things. I was convinced 
that the child who imagins to itself God as a mighty, 
aged man; the savage, who thinks him to be a de^ 


’* ALAMONTADA. 73 

Btructiv fire— that all, with child-like daringaess, de- 
ceived themselvs. 

‘ But, dear Alamontada,’ said I, ‘ man is in spite 
of all, a very sensual being, and his power of imag- 
ination cannot rest. It demands to represent to it- 
self the supreme being in some manner. Thou must 
confess thyself that thou art not always capable to 
keep thy mind upon the same bight of strained med- 
itation; that it relieves thee, tüen, to think of God, 
when thy spirit has relaxed under the pressure of thy 
mortal body and circumstances.’ 

Certainly,’ replied Alamontada. ‘Not always 
am I inclined and able to think the godhead in clear 
ideas. It is pleasing to me, as a man, to draw God, 
as it were, nearer to me and to make him better ac- 
quainted with the rest of my perceptions. In such 
hours he appears to me as a sacred, all* loving being, 
who has called myself and all else into existence to 
enjoy blissfulness. His wisdom, of which millions 
of testimonials occupy me, and his holiness, awaken 
in me a childlike, unlimited confidence in him, as 
my father. It pleases me to giv myself up to him. 
It does me good to cry out my grief before him. It 
satisfies me to complain to him what my human 
brethren do not want to hear. I am then not en- 
tirely. forsaken, and there is one who takes pity upon 
me. 

“ ‘ Behold, dear sir, this belief in God, the neces- 
sity, the unavoidableness, of my eternal existence, 
no matter how and where — this is my religion. And 
this religion hav all nations, all human beings who 
to some degree enjoy the development of their reason. 

“ ‘ And Jesus Christ has rendered therein a great 
service to humanity, that he has represented to them 


74 


ALAMONTADÄ. 


God under the picture of the father, a& the holiest, 
most perfect, as the all-blissful and all-blessing be- ; 
ing, but which can be comprehended by no earthly ! 
sense, 

“ ‘ But his teaching took, as it came to the different 
nations, colors and additions, according as a nation 
had already been more or less cultivated, or accord- j 
ing to the difference of their religious preconceptions, 
which it had before the appearance of Christianity, 
and afterward melted together, willipgly or unwil- 
lingly, with this. 

“‘There is an endless difference of degrees from ' 
low, coarse sensuality up to the trained ]>ower of rea- 
son. This variety causes the variety (not of religion, | 
for there is only one religion in the universe), 
the additions to religion, which are often taken for 
one and the same, and on that account man believes 
in a plurality of religions. Therefore arose and will 
arise the different religious parties, in these parties 
again the sects, and in the sects again the peculiar 
religious perceptions of each individual. How can 
it bo otherwise? Every educated person changes 
his religion more than once during life, as his knowl- 
edge, his moral wants, and his temperament change. 
Another faith has the child ; another, when it ripens 
into youth; another, as a young man; another, as a 
man rich in experience and foretheught; another, 
when he seizes the supporting staff of old age. 

“‘And leave to them still this variety, which you 
cannot root out. Every one has a belief answering 
to his wants; changes the want, then thrives the 
busy mind further up, and the buds unfold them- 
selvs to blossoms, and he is enveloped by a new be- 
lief. You cannot become a world -reformer with the - 


ALAMONTADA. 


75 


sword. Opinions and ideas cannot be trimmed with 
the iron shears of power. Every religion becomes 
purer and nobler through cutting loose from the 
coarser and then from the finer sensuality, and 
strengthening of reason. Leave to the Roman Cath- 
olic his grand pomp in temples and altars, and to 
the Mennonite his rustic simplicity, and to the 
thinker the quiet meditation within the walls of his 
study-room. Only clear away every v\ here obstacles 
which oppose the education of the mind; make him 
freer, more fit to think, and you hav done all that 
you are obliged to do. 

“ ‘ Every man has his religion, except he only, 
who, with all talents, has not courage enough to con- 
sider himself, but floats in confused doubts, and, in 
order to rid himself of their uncomfortableness, 
seeks to extinguish their memory in sensual dissipa- 
tion, and with one proposition, accepted indiscrim- 
inately and without further examination. These un- 
fortunate beings, whose teacher of morals and right 
is only convenience, knot in themselvs the outer ends 
of human education together; brutality of their an- 
imal nature, with keen-sensedness, wit, and power of 
discrimination. 

If the voice of unconquerable nature (the law of 
reason) did not, against their expectations and 
against their will, sometimes speak in their breast, 
and thus compel them to acknowledge there is right, 
and, say what one will, virtue is amiable; and did 
not this gigantic power pull them along against 
their will, truly, sir, these human beings would be 
the most dangerous beasts on the globe. The fright- 
ful inclinations, the passions of the wild animal are 


76 


ALAMU^ T AL»A. 


in them, terribly coupled with the prudence of the 
human mind.’ 

“ ‘ Dear Alamontada,’ said I, moved by the power 
and highness with which he spoke to me, * then thou 
also believest that the wisest among mortals must 
hav religion, not only because he will and shall not 
be a being in opposition with himself, but, also, be- 
cause he needs a religion in order to be virtuous. I 
confess, to my astonishment, about that thou hast 
hitherto been entirely silent. For one comprehends 
in that which thou callest religion what others call 
natural religion, or religion of reason, not only a 
belief in a God and the immortality of the spirit, 
but, also, of the holy order of the universe, that is, 
!jhe belief that, here or there, sooner or later, recom- 
pense takes place, a imnishment of vice, a reward of 
noble souls. To that, my dear, I would hav liked 
long ago to hav called thy attention, if fear to inter- ' 
rupt the course of thy thoughts had not kept me 
back.’ 


CHAPTER XIII. 

“ * Religions proper, as far as they point to recom- 
pense and morality, are not at all so related that 
they should influence each other,’ answered Ala- 
montada. ‘ Religion, or the belief in God and im- 
mortality, as necessary as it may be, exists, properly 
speaking, for itself alone, and has with that which 
we call reward of virtue no connection, as true virtue 
is independent, and without any regard to God, of 
immortality, of recompense. 


ALAMONTADA. 


77 


“ ‘ But it is a good idea to make religion, in that 
sense, an educator of immature humanity. It is the 
safest support, on which we gradually lift oursclvs 
up from the low sensuality to independence of reason. 

“‘The eternal moral law, dwelling within us, in 
all times and regions the same, tells us how we, as 
reasonable beings, should act. And if I now act so, 
as I ought according to this eternal law, then I am 
what I really should be, a free, self-acting, definit 
spirit — a spirit issuing only from within itself, only 
through its own, within-itself hidden law. If I do 
something for my profit, then I am not virtuous; ev- 
ery animal does the same; it fears in many a case 
punishment, it receives in some cases its agreeable 
reward. Virtue demands for itself no reward; it 
cannot be bought, not paid; it expects no recom- 
pense. It exercises itself without regard to the suc- 
cess of the act; sufficient, that so to act is ordained 
by the moral law. Virtue is nothing else than the 
appearance of the acting, sacred spirit of man in its 
truthfulness. A spirit, without connection with, or 
without being influenced by, a body working with 
animal-like intentions and interests, would, if it 
acted, act only good; it could never act immoral; it 
would be saint-like, that is, free from defects of mo- 
rality. Even that our spirit is enveloped in a body, 
which often works against spiritual law, or nature, 
strengthens the power of the spirit in the battle. 
And if i^ and it only, acts; if it is not guided by 
sensual interests, neither from fear of punishment, 
nor hope of gain, works after its own law, then it is 
virtuous, that is, free, powerful, self-acting, or spirit 
as it ought to be, and really worthy of its own dig- 
nity. 


78 


ALAMONTADA. 


“ ‘If there lay not the idea of divinity and immor- 
tality within it, it would nevertheless be able to act 
good and virtuou^^ly. There are many that believe in 
God and immortality without being virtuous. There 
can be such, who, torn by doubts, without faith, are 
nevertheless virtuous. 

“‘Virtue and sensual well-being, or what is com- 
monly called happiness, are two separate and distinct 
things, and the one not existing on account of the 
other. Through prudence I can increase my well-be- 
ing, but accidental it is if this happens through vir- 
tue. And it continues only so long as virtue may 
go hand-in-hand with prudence. Yet it is often tho 
case that I must sacrifice all my well-being, because 
I act virtuously, that is, independent of fear or hope, 
after the sacred law within me. 

“ ‘ The virtuous man loves his duty with the same 
severe, unconquerable zeal as that with which others 
love their right. He can, like others for their right, 
joyfully meet certain death for his duty. For duties 
arc the iron, indestructible rights of a moral spirit. 

“ ‘ So then it has been only weakness and short- 
sightedness, or prudence, in those who taught that 
morality and well-being should always be in har- 
mony, and that, because misery only too often fol- 
lows the footsteps of virtue, in a future life a moral 
recompense, a harmony of both aims, of this by 
them so-called highest good, should take place. 

“‘As the germ, which I drop into the ground, so 
the human spirit that drops into the universe. As 
the germ, after tho physical laws, in consequence of 
its organization, sinks roots and thrives, and shouts 
forth trunk and blossom and leaves, without other 
aim, but simply because it is so in its proportions, so 


ALAÜONTADA.. 


79 


tlie spirit of mao, when it appears tis it is, as it ought 
to be, after the order lying within itself, morally 
good and without other aim. There is between the 
eo-called laws of the physical and spiritual world only 
a difference in name. In reality they are one and 
the same; the moral law is the natural law of the 
human spirit, in which it must wort, because, as a 
moral, as a true spirit, it cannot do otherwise. 

“ ‘ The good done out of fear of God, in hope of 
recompense, or from fear of future punishment, is 
only piety, but by no means freedom of the acting 
spirit, or virtue. Piety, however, breaks the chains 
of sensuality; prepares, as it were, the freedom of 
the spirit, leads to virtue, and, in that respect, is val- 
uable as an educational means for nations. It is 
asking too much, that every man, without fear, with- 
out hope, should act good simply for the sake of 
good; it is asking too much of the child that it, 
hardly born, should walk without having first grad- 
ually exercised its strength; of the spirit, that it 
should suddenly appear in the splendor of its power, 
purity, and independence, without preliminary trials- 

‘ For the training of immature humanity is the 
doctrin of a final agreement of morality and well- 
being indispensable; in the same manner as for the 
savage, tho sword of civil justice becomes the means 
of leading him to lawful behavior.’ 

‘ What 1 ’ cried I, astonished, ‘ all these thou- 
sands who courageously, in the hope of a better life, 
confiding in their recompensing God, bear the suffer- 
ing of the earth, and willingly sacrifice their own wel- 
fare, if it depends upon the fulfilment of duties — 
how, Alamontada, they were no virtuous people ? ’ 

‘‘ ‘ No,’ answered the old man, ‘ they are more 


80 


alamontada. 


prudent than virtuous, for they sacrifice willingly 
their small possession in the expectation to receive 
in return a larger one. But they are pious people, 
and approaching their perfection. They are venera- 
ble to me; they are dear to me. They need only 
one more step, and they are perfectly free. 

“ ‘ You see, dear sir, this is the reason why I spoke 
in my religion absolutely of no moral obligation, of 
no virtue, of no judge of the universe. The spirit 
acts as it must. Its virtue is no pious calculation ; 
it calls to its assistance no secondary intention. It 
needs for itself no reward; it even cannot be re- 
warded except it be through the self-consciousnesss 
of power, of self-will, and freedom, to which it has 
worked itself up. It counts its most beautiful mo- 
ments after the triumphs over sensuality. 

“ ‘ And when we now hav to suffer in consequence 
of our virtue, dear sir, what, then, is it that suffers ? 
It is not the spirit, for it enjoys just then the victory 
— only the sensual nature of man suffers. This, there- 
fore, would hav to be rewarded for its self-sacrifice; 
but how can it become so when the corpse returns to 
the dust ? And, tell me, what in the end means re- 
ward, recompense ? If I for a life-time carry about 
with me a sickly body, would I be in a second life 
rewarded with a healthy one ? Had I on that ac- 
count not borne the pains? Had I not wept the 
thousand tears of grief ?’ 

“ ‘Friend,’ replied I with some shuddering, ‘I feel 
the truth of thy words; but they are hard, they are 
comfortless. Had not the poor man, oppressed by 
thousands of troubles, the sweet expectation— thou 
Bufferest not in vain; one day thy load shall be taken 
away, at last thy misery be doubly rewarded with 


ALAMONTADA. 81 

endless blissfulness — alas, friend, he would hav to 
despair often !’ 

“ ‘ It is true,’ answered Alamontada, ‘ the sensual, 
immature man, who believes in a recompenser above 
the stars despairs not. But the more perfect, the 
spirit-man, despairs still less than he. His body suf- 
fers, but not his irreproachable spirit. He knows 
that, sooner or later, with this body the torment is 
taken from him. Moreover, dear sir, let us not wan- 
der about in dark ideas, but, more distinct, in that of 
which we speak. We speak of suffering. All sufftr- 
ing is only sensual. The spirit has no other suffering 
than the consciousness to hav done wrong, that is, to 
hav been conquered in the strife with the low, sen- 
sual world. 

“‘But all suffering is again in itself different. 
Bodily pains are never lasting, and are on that ac- 
count endurable, because one knows that death or 
recovery of the body frees from them. I, conse- 
quently, think if we talk of evils that would be too 
heavy for man, we should not mean th( reby bodily 
diseases. They are always of only short duration, 
and leave, even while they rage, yet numerous mo- 
menta of rest. 

“ ‘ But more bitter are the so-called sufferings of 
the soul. Of these it is worth the while to speak. I 
remember no man who on account of his bodily dis- 
ease despaired; but more than one succumbed under 
grief when he had to leave the lap of wealth and 
seize the beggar’s staff; or when trusted friendship 
betrayed him; or when he, innocently or guiltily, 
was exposed to shame and disgrace; or when he lost 
irreparably a prospect or a happiness on the lasting- 
ncBs of which he had relied. 


82 


ALAMONTADA. 


“ ‘ Well, dear sir, whence come these sufferings ? 
They arise from false conception of the value of 
things, when our low, sensual nature outweighs the 
spiritual. What are wealth and poverty ? Only pro- 
portions. The wealthy among the hordes of Indians 
would be a poor one in European capitals. To be- 
come poor means nothing but to hav to deny one s 
body something to which it is accustomed. He who 
cannot do this in case of necessity is more animal 
than spirit; and does he want recompense in a better 
world for not being an animal ? Is poverty an un- 
endurable misfortune ? How many a one complains 
over poverty who is still richer than millions of his 
fellow-beings ! His complaint is more ridiculous and 
contemptible than deserving of sympathy. 

“‘Honor and shame; how much do they depend 
upon circumstance ! In virtue alone is honor; in vice 
alone shame. The virtuous may be indifferent to the 
opinion of the world. He who has not yet succeeded 
to find his own worth in quiet fulfilment of his duties 
and with clear conscience to elevate himself above 
the fickle opinion of the great mass, is a poor, piti- 
able creature, more animal than spirit; more child 
than mature man. He clings in sad blindness more 
to the changeable play of circumstances than to the 
eternally true and good. 

“ As with this so it is with all our so-called suffer- 
ings of the soul. Our own weakness causes them, 
our moral power destroys them. There hav been 
men who hav thrown away their time to reason away 
the evils of life, or to defend them, in order, as they 
claimed, to rescue the honor of their God, or to 
sweeten them with awakened hope of a better lot on 
the other side of the grave. But what is all this for i 


ALAilONTADA. 


83 


These evils are oecessary in the order of the world, 
and their existence a proof of that for which we are 
destined. But our destiny is ripeness or perfection 
of our spirit. It is ripe, it is perfect, when it acts in- 
dependent of the influence of sensual power, throi’gh 
itself, after its own laws. The evils of humanity 
drive the spirit to its independence. Therefore is 
the proverb, Misfortune makes philosophers, a truth 
too little understood. The fickleness of the earthly 
calls our attention to the lasting worth of the spirit- 
ual. The dust pushes the spirit away from it, and 
compels it to recognize its own dignity, Man, as he 
perceives the change of things, scorns to further 
belong to them, and returns to himself and becomes 
independent; he learns at last the high wisdom, 
Man’s spirit is for no other end but for itself. 

“ ‘ The pure feeling of the independence of the 
spirit is the guarantee for its imperishableness. So 
it was ordained by the creator of the universe, that 
man’s spirit should be driven back to itself by all 
things, in order to find in itself and not in otlnii s 
outside, its happiness, its goal, its highness. Were 
it destined to serve as means for other aims, then it 
would hav to disappeir as soon as these disappear.’ ” 


CHAPTER XIV. 

“ I was carried away in spite of myself with the 
train of thoughts of my stoic philosopher,” said Abb6 
Dillon. “ I became aware of a hitherto unknown 
sentiment within myself. Earthly possessions, with 
their splendor and charms for the senses, vanished in 
|he feeling of my true self. I became aware that 


84 


ALAMONTADA. 


they did not belong to me, and I not to them. The 
universe appeared new. I beheld it from an un- 
imagiucd point of view. Alamontada remained si- 
lent, as if he had discovered my frame of mind; as if 
he wanted to giv me time to re- collect myself under 
this strange horizon. It was not necessary. The 
spirit sees in every truth its home and its property ; 
only error is to it a strange country. 

“‘O Alamontada,’ cried I, ‘now I comprehend 
it, how thou canst die with tranquil soul, and harm- 
lessly canst await for thy spirit to act the further 
part on another stage ! Yet I confess to thee that 
it would be well for man if the veil before the future 
life were raised just a little; if the ordainer of the 
universe had in soine way revealed himself, that no 
one could fall into the disease of doubt concerning 
that.’ 

“‘How, dear sir,’ said Alamontada; ‘you be- 
lieve that it would be better for mankind ? To what 
man? To the immature, to the one that is still 
clinging to sensuality? No, dear sir, that one would 
be just as well and just as badly off as now. He is 
not made happy by the spiritual, but by that which 
springs from the earthly. He is blessed by the feel- 
ing of agreeable superabundance, wherein he may 
liv, the feeling of glory, of public esteem, of friend- 
ship, of tender love, of beauty, of the useful and the 
like. 

“ ‘ To the immature man the charm of the power 
of imagination replaces for a time what is lacking in 
him of revelation. He is on that account not more 
unhappy. You see how merrily he dances through 
his life as long as sickness, mistaken ness, povertv, 
enmity, or any other sensual evil does not ti publg him. 


ALAMONTADA. 


85 


** ‘ But the educated man in the state of his matu- 
rity demands no higher revelations about the sacred 
mysteries of the universe than he already possesses. 
He cannot wish them.’ 

“ ‘ He cannot wish them ?’ asked I. ‘ I do not un- 
derstand thee.’ 

‘‘ ‘ He cannot,’ answered the philosopher, ‘ because 
he would not wish the impossible. Not to the senses 
the godhead could reveal itself, but to the spirit. It 
did so while it has built ourselvs that the same must 
think and believe it from necessity. It did so while 
it as primitiv power filled the universe with its phe- 
nomena, which we perceive by means of the sensual 
organs. While the creator, as it were, through the 
mouth of our reason speaks to us, “I am,” and in the 
same moment unfurls before our eyes the phenom- 
ena of his wonderful power, extir'guishing all doubts 
— doubts which never arise from reason, but from 
fancy and through experiences of the sensual world. 

“ ‘ Once more, I repeat to you, all throughout the 
whole of nature, all that we possess and experience, 
all that we discover within us, and all that we know 
— all, say I, limits the spirit finally to itself, leads it 
with gentle power to independence. This we must 
look upon as the last aim of our acts, as our destiny, 
as our highness. 

“ ‘True it is, this earthly life is full of imaginary 
evil; nothing is lasting therein; all changes, and we 
are carried away by an irresistible flood of undesired 
events and fates. But let us not complain about that 
so loudly. Even this is a hint from the creator tlat 
we elevate ourselvs above the earthly and finite, and 
should find our salvation and our gonl, not in this, 
but in our own self. The spirit of man is not the 


86 


ALAMONTADA. 


property of the sensual j it also has no other prop- 
erty than itself alone. Even the organs of sense 
with which he as man for a time is connected remain 
not for it, 

“ ‘True it is that we of the millions of objects 
which float about us in the universe comprehend but 
few; that we only know the objects, what they are 
in relation to us, but not what they may be for 
themselvs. But on that account we will not be 
frightened. For that we always dwell upon our im- 
agination, that we are always confined to our own 
inner world, this is the sacred proof of our worth, of 
our highness, of our independence as spirits. We 
behold ourselvs in not one single connection which 
degrades us to subordination to a being foreign to 
ourselvs, or even suffered to imagin this degradation. 
We stand alone, but we stand for ourselvs in the un- 
limited realm of creation. We walk through the 
wonderful phenomena, and are touched and left by 
them; and in the stormy drama our spirit awakens 
and recognizes itself, and develops its power, and be- 
comes what it should be, a holy, self-acting being, 
connected with a strange formation of matter which 
we call body, our feet, as it were, walking in the 
dust, our heads touching divinity. 

Yes, I am an independent being, created for 
myself, and while everything only leads mo back to 
myself, and the whole surrounding nature guarantees 
my being, and even thereby teaches me to know my 
worth, my highness in the succession of things, I be- 
hold in the independence of myself the title deed of 
my eternity. 

“‘May then the sensual man tremble when what 
is earthly about him falls to pieces, and he fan- 


ALAMONTADA. 


87 


cies to lose himself. That which thinks in thij? 
corpse is not dust, is not phenomenon, hke the dust, 
but a primitiv power, which itself produces phenom- 
ena. It lasts, it works further. Nonsense it wouid 
be to say the powers of the universe are lost out of 
the universe, or the world could be lost out of itself. 

‘‘‘The slightest self-observation teaches me that 
my self-acting I is of a different nature from the ap- 
pearance that I call my corpse. May this becen e 
dissolved into the matters, moving and enliveuii g 
powers, out of which producing nature put it to- 
gether, my I continues in its manhood and survives 
the change of phenomena. 

“ ‘ Soon, oh, soon this dust falls apart,’ continued 
Alamontada, and his eyes beamed brighter toward 
heaven. ‘ Be it so. I stand an indestructible ])art 
in the circle of the order of the universe. Tl-e 
spirit’s wonderful realm is my home. In it dwell 
beings like myself; there my brethren! 

“ ‘Much, much havl suffered in my human nature. 
But well for me ! In these storms my power ii])ened 
quicker. I hav finished the strife, and in the depths 
of misery I felt unspeakable happiness; despised, 
and in the eyes of humanity an outcast, I felt my no- 
bility, which no human sentence can erase; the bench 
of the galley was my school-bench ; languishing nii 
the glowing coasts of Africa, I became aware of the 
riches I possessed that could not be taken away 
from me. Ob, how fortunate am I ! At the end of a 
painful race-course I look back with pleasure, for all 
thorns now bloom so beautifully, they that I once 
hated because they wounded me. 

“ ‘ And thou,’ continued Alamontada, and a glori- 
fication* as it were, floated about his face, whüe I sat; 


88 


ALAMONTADA. 


there in reverence, as before the flying bed of a 
saint, and my eyes overflowed with tears — ‘ O thou 
lofty, unknown, most sacred, through which I was 
called into existence, I am thine, and thine eternally. 
High hast thou placed me in the order of thy be- 
ings, O thou inexpressible one ! For I dare imagin 
thee, dare think thee; thou thyself speakest of thee 
within me. O father-spirit ! father-spirit ! I am still 
human, and therefore of child-like sense, and the 
thought of thee is accompanied by the warm feeling, 
therefore I speak to thee. My talk is child’s lisping 
to the father-spirit — human thanks ! IIow happy am I 
that I am ! In thee I liv. Through thee I elevate 
myself, and glide from one round of thy all to the 

other. O father-spirit ’ 

“Here his speech grad’ially became lower and 
more indistinct. It seemed as if his spirit was shak- 
ing off the fetters of words in order to ascend in 
swift flight. A wonderful rapture beamed in his 
features. Now and then his lips quivered, as in low 
prayer, as if the tired body would accompany the 
spirit in its devotion, in its thanks to God.” 


CHAPTER XV. 

So far the good Abb6 Dillon read. Midnight had 
overtaken us. But neither of us was tired. We 
were silent. Tears trembled in our eyes. I threw 
myself on Dillon’s breast. Roderick embraced him 
also. We so held him, speechless, for a long time to 
our beating hearts. It seemed to us as if we were 
pressing the noble Alamontada himself to our 


ALAMONTADA. 89 

breasts ; as if our thanks were not given to the abb6 ; 
no, as if they were given to him. 

“ And so I also once sunk on to his heart,” said 
Dillon. “ ‘ O man ! ’ cried I, deeply moved, ‘ how 
was it possible that humanity cast thee out of their 
midst ? How couldst thou with this lofty spirit be- 
come a criminal? Since when is the virtuous forged 
to the galley-bench? Wast thou, perhaps, so great 
a sinner that human society had to be afraid of thee? 
This is not possible, Alamontada ! Thou hast been 
innocently condemned to the most cruel punishment. 
Oh, so speak ! I undertake thy justification. Thou 
shalt, thou must once more return honored into tho 
ranks of humanity. Disgrace shall not rest upon thy 
grave t’ 

“ He was very deeply moved. He pressed mo 
with emotion to himself, and his eyes melted in 
tears. ‘ Oh ! ’ cried he, ‘ yet once more a man, a 
brother on this long-ago forsaken poor heart ! Ah ! 
it has in these nine-and-twenty years of its loneliness 
not yet forgotten how to love; it feels once more its 
old happiness before it breaks ! * In his sadness he 
could speak no more. He silently wept. 

“ After a long pause he raised his face to me and 
said : ‘ O sir, dear sir, how hav I deserved so much 
kindness and love?’ 

“‘Could I prolong thy life, dear man,’ I ex- 
claimed, ‘willingly I would sacrifice my own for 
that ! But thou knowest not that thou art my bene- 
factor, my guardian angel. Thou knowest not that 
thou hast lifted me out of the abysses of doubt. I 
was sent to thee to lead thee back to religion, O 
Alamontada ! and tliou it wast who led me back and 
gave me the lost religion.’ 


90 


ALA-MONTADA. 


“He did not seem to understand me. ‘Behold, 
Alamontada, I was an unfortuna^ being when I 
came to thee. I had lost God out of my world, and 
stared trembling into the future, as into a lifeless 
darkness. Doubts over all, over my having and 
being, enveloped me. I staggered about between 
contradictions, and became with my nonsense a bur- 
den and a disgust to myself. Thou, friend, hast 
raised me up again, and hast shown me to myself in 
my true nature and dignity. God, immortality, and 
independence of myself— they are ! My spirit cannot 
deny itself. Through thee I am again in harmony 
with nature; before me, lying on the scales of eternal 
reason, the worthiness and unworthiness of things 
are weighed. Darkness clears up again, and that 
which was desolate blossoms with young life! And 
all that was given me by thyself ! ’ 

“ In this beautiful hour it w'as that Alamontada’s 
heart opened itself to me. He gave me, in torn 
leaves, his diary. He made me, at my urgent re- 
quest, acquainted with many events of his life. 
I need not now say, Alamontada was innocent 1 I 
would at once begin to work at his justification. I 
wanted that justice should giv him public satisfac- 
tion — giv back to him the honor of which it had 
robbed him. He shook his head, and begged me, so 
long as he lived, to take no step toward that end. 
He was not desirous of the esteem of a world which 
had cast him out so long, so mercilessly, and pre- 
ferred his last days to belong undivided and undis- 
turbed to himself- 

“ I at once procured for him, from the authorities, 
a better room and greater comforts. With pleasure 
I would hav sacrifice 1 all I possessed to prepare for 


ALAMONTADA, 


91 


bim a joyful moment after so many endured suffer- 
ings. Alas ! that I became acquainted with him so 
late ! 

“Upon my repeated request to communicate to 
me all his wishes, even the most secret ones, he 
finally said: ‘Well, write to Nismes or Montpellier, 
to find out what has become of Clementine — if she 
still livs ; whether she has married ; whether she 
has been happy.’ 

“I knew this Clementine from his papers and his 
oral communications. ‘ And how, Alamontada,’ 
said I, ‘if now Clementine still livs? Wouldst thou 
not want to see her once more? ’ 

“ He smiled quietly to himself at this question. 
‘ Ah ! she was the angel who magically beautified 
my youth, and weeping accompanied me to the 
threshold of my lost Eden. No, do not trouble your- 
self, my dear sir. She will no more think of Ala- 
montada, if she livs, and much less will she care to 
make a journey to the dying-bed of a galley-slave.’ 

“ I wrote. I summoned the aid of all my friends, 
of all my acquaintances, to discover Clementine and 
to induce her to hasten without delay to Toulon, 
where important news awaited her. Finally I suc- 
ceeded by one of my friends in finding out her abode ' 
It was in Montpellier, whither she had returned from 
Paris a few years before. She hardly had learned 
about Alamontada when she concluded to undertake 
the journey to Toulon, notwithstanding her lying 
sick with a severe disease 

“Yet, beloved,” continued Dillon, “we forget that 
midnight has past, that we need rest. To-morrow, 
if you desire, I will relate to you the story of our 
mutual friend. It is instructiv. Only a man like 


92 


ALAMONTADA 


Alamontada could bear so cruel a fate without per- 
ishing under it. With his eye upon God, elevated 
above his own pain, he walked heroically through a 
terrible life, of which each hour was more horrible 
than death.” 

At these words Dillon arose. We followed his 
invitation. We embraced him with heart felt thanks. 
“ What you, dear abbe, once said to the venerable 
slave, when you thanked him for your conversion, 
you hav spoken also in our names !” exclaimed 1. 
“ What a majestic being this Alamontada in his 
chains ! What a mighty, rare spirit ! His words 
sound like oracles, and make man more divine. I 
will copy his speeches. They are only fragments, 
but in themselvs complete. One must read them 
ofteiier, hear them oftener, in order to enter fully 
into the beautiful tabernacle of their meaning.” 

“And I erect to his memory an altar in my gar- 
den,” cried Roderick, “ the sight of which will al- 
ways strengthen me. If I falter, I shall think of 
Alamontada, and my untrained, feeble spirit will lift 
itself up in the memory of him and be strong ! ” 

So we separated, filled with enthusiasm. The 
dawn of morning found us sooner than sleep. 


SECOND BOOK. 


CHAPTER I. 

When we were together in the conservatory the 
abb^ drew forth a note-book. ‘‘ Here,” said he, is 
Alam^tada’s story as I with the greatest care 
hav put it together. I gave to it all only the uniting 
thread ; they are Alamontada’s thoughts and words 
that I hav strung upon it. Many a thing you will 
find therein very short, others again very minutely 
related, according as the narrator was more or less 
touched by the affairs of his past, or my questions 
induced him thereto.” 

Our curiosity was excited in the highest degree. 
To me it had become quite incomprehensible how a 
galley- slave could possess such mature wisdom, such 
manifold accomplishments, or how such a man 
through sentence of a court could be brought to that 
cruel disgrace. At any rate this man always re- 
mained a most remarkable being, as remarkable as 
were his views of the world. What tenderness of 
feeling, united with greatness of mind ! What hero- 
ism of purest virtue, and what hard fate for it ! How 
vanishes beneath his loftiness the greatness of those 
heroes of antiquity, which makes us tremble only 
through the magic work of the poets ! A spirit like 
that of the beloved slave is far beyond the reach of 
all poetic description. Forsaken, unassuming, and 
therefore the nobler, his virtue walked over degrad- 
ing sensuality, noticeable only to the eye of reason. 


94 


ALAMONTADA. 


The poet, while touching the chords of emotion, 
loves to behold objects of the sensual world only; 
even his gods he clothes in shining colors. 

But let me hasten to the story. Dillon, shaded by 
the leaves of the grapevine at the window, read. 
Never shall I forget this beautiful hour. 


CHAPTER II. 

A small village in Languedoc was my home and 
the place of my birth (so began Alamontada). I lost 
my mother very early. My father, a poor peasant, 
could, in spite of his economy, spare but little for 
my education. Yet he was by far not the poorest in 
the village. But, besides the tithes from his vin- 
yard, oliv-trees, and fields, he must giv from the re- 
mainder of his scanty profits, gained by hard labor, 
one-fourth for various taxes. Our daily food was' 
soup with black bread and turnips. 

My father became distressed. This pained him 
very much. “ O Colas ! ” said he more than once to 
me in grieved tones, laying his hand upon my head, 
“ my hopes perish. I shall not be able, notwithstand- 
ing the sweat of my brow, to gain for myself a coflän 
free from debt. How then shall I redeem the word 
given to thy mother with my last kiss upon her death- 
bed? I promised her so sacredly to keep thee at 
school, and make a clergyman of thee. Thou wilt 
become a day laborer, and serve others ! ” 

Thereupon I consoled tlie good old man as well as 
I could. But my childish consolation only afllicted 
him still more. He became more sickly and felt the 
approach of his last days. He often looked at me 


ALAMONTADA. 


95 


movea, full of sorrow for my future; and the bitter 
tears of hopelessness wet his eyes. I left my play 
when I saw this. I ran up to him, for I could not 
bear to see him weep. I threw my arms around his 
neck, kissed the tears from his eyelashes, and ex- 
claimed, sobbing, “ O my father, do not weep!” 

What a happy people might inhabit that country, 
where the fertil soil yields two crops yearly to its 
tillers, and olivs and grapes ripen abundantly under 
the warm rays of the sun ! But over the blooming 
earth drags heavily a crushed race, which must giv 
the fruit of its distress and want to feasting bishops, 
who, for the sufferings here below, promis to it un- 
ceasing pleasure in the life to come; givs its gain to 
noblemen and princes, who in return would rule the 
land with kindness and wisdom. A banquet at the 
royal court swallowed up a whole year’s fruit of an 
entire province, which was wrested from the lap of 
the earth under millions of sighs and under millions 
of sweat-drops. 

I was eighteen years old when my father died. It 
was a pleasant evening, the sun aböut to set. My 
father sat before the hut, in the shade of the chestnut- 
tree. He would once more enjoy the view of the 
world, which, in spite of all suffering, had become 
dear to him. I came from the field. He was very 
weak. I went to him. He embraced me. “Omy 
son !” said he, “now I feel well. My work is done, 
and I go to rest. Yet I shall not forget thee. I 
shall stand before the throne of God with thy 
mother; we will pray for thee above the stars. 
Think of ns, and be true to virtue until death; we 
will pray for thee. God cares for thee. And weep 
not, for if once thy day’s work is done, for thee also 


ALAMONTADA. 


9fv 

will come the hour of rest. Then thou wilt agnin 
find us above, me and thy mother. Ah ! Cola«, with 
what longing will we there await thee, and how joy- 
fully will heat again the three hearts of parents and 
child on one another, before the throne of God ! ” 
The last ray of the sun faded on the mountain- 
peaks j and the gloom of twilight spread over the 
earth. The spirit of my father was free from the 
frail body that enveloped it. His dear remains lay 
in my iijras. 


CHAPTER III. 

The faithful servant — his name I hav forgotten — 
who was to bring me, according to the last will of 
my father, to my mother’s brother, Mr. Etienne, in 
Nismes, held me by the hand as we walked through 
its dark, narrow streets. I trembled. An irrepress- 
ible shudder seized my soul. 

‘‘Thou tremblest, Colas,” said the servant. “ Thou 
lookest pale and gloomy. Art thou not well ? ” 

“ Ah ! ” cried I, “ do not bring me hither in this 
dark stone labyrinth. I feel as if I had to die here. 
Let me be a day laborer in my free, green home. 
Look at these walls — they stand like walls of prisons. 
And these people, they seem so restless, so gloomy, 
as if they were criminals.” 

“Thy uncle, the miller, does not liv in this town; 
his house is before the Carmelite-gate,* in the free, 
green country.” 

The secret power is ascribed to the soul to antici- 


*Carmelites. An order of monks established on Mount 
Carmel, in Syria, in the twelfth century. 


ALAMONTADA. 


97 


pate its future fate. When I had become a compan- 
ion of the frightful tragedy, the history of which has 
filled with terror the hearts of all feeling humanity, 
I recollected this first sad, anxious feeling of my 
soul, which I experienced on first entering the streets 
of gloomy Nismes, and looked at it as a foreboding. 
Even the most enlightened man cannot entirely cut 
loose from superstitious fear, when his despairing 
hope in vain feels around in the dark for aid. 

The impression that Nismes had made upon mo re- 
mained with me forever. As I was accustomed to 
liv in and with free nature, lonely and simple, I was 
scared by the commotion of the crowd of people of 
this busy city. My mother had rocked me under the 
branches of the oliv-tree, and in the green, idcasant 
dusk of the chestnut-groves I had dreamed my child- 
hood away. How was I able to endure it between 
these dark, narrow walls, where only thirst for gain 
brings people together ? In solitude the passions die ; 
the heart becomes as quiet as the surrounding land- 
scape. On that account I was frightened at the first 
sight of so many human faces in which anger and 
care, pride and avarice, revelry and envy, had left 
their traces, which he no longer notices who sees 
them day by day. 

Before the gate of the Carmelite was the house of 
my uncle, and near it his mill. The servant pointed 
with his hand to the pretty building, and said: 

‘‘ Mr. Etienne is a rich man, but too bad — ” 

“ And what then too bad ? ” 

“ A Calvinist, as people say.” 

I did not understand him. We entered the fine 
building. My anxiety vanished at my entrance. A 
quiet, homelike feeling spoke to me from everything 


98 


alamontada. 


that I saw, and I began to feel as well as in my own 
home. 

In the neat room full of simplicity and order sat 
the mother at the table, surrounded by three bloom- 
ing daughters, busy with domestic wcrlr. A two- 
year-old boy sat in the mother’s lap playing. Good» 
ness and calmness dwelt in every face. They were 
all silent, and fastened their eyes upon me. My 
uncle stood at the window and read in a book. Al- 
ready his locks were gray, but a youthful cheerful- 
ness beamed in his looks. Ilis features were the fea- 
tures of piety. 

The servant said to him : This is your nephew 
Colas, Mr. Etienne. For his father, your sister’s 
husband, has died, and in poverty. Therefore he 
commanded me to bring his son to you, that yon 
might be his father.” 

“ Be welcomed and blessed. Colas ! ” said Mr. Eti- 
enne, as he laid his hands upon my head, “ I will be 
thy father.” 

Then the woman arose, took my hand, and said, 
“I will be thy mother.” 

This kindness moved my heart. I wept, and kissed 
the hands of the new father and the new mother, 
without being able to speak a word. Thereupon the 
three daughters surrounded me and said, “ Do not 
weep, Colas ; we are thy sisters.” 

From this moment I was as familiar in this new 
home as if I had never been a stranger therein. I 
believed to liv in a family of quiet angels, of whom 
my father oft had told me. I became as pious as 
they all, and yet was never the most pious. 

I was kept at school. Half a year afterward Mr. 
Etienne stepped up to me, and said with friendly 


ALAMONTiVDA. 


99 


j look; “Colas, thou art poor, but God has blessed 
I thee with beautiful talents. Thy teachers all praise 
to me thy diligence and that thou excellest all thy 
I sr>ool-fellows in learning. Therefore hav I con- 
; eluded that thou shalt study the scic nces, and be- 
; come a learned man. When thou has finished thy 
f school-years in Nismes, I shall send thee to the uni- 
j versity at Montpellier. Thou shalt study law, and 
{ then thou canst become a defender of our oppressed 
church. I see in thee an instrument of God for our 
rescue, and a protector of the evangelical faith 
against the cruelties and abuses of the papists.” 

Mr. Etienne was a secret Protestant, as with him 
a few thousands in Nismes and the surrounding 
country were. He initiated me into his faith. The 
Protestants were industrious, quiet, benevolent cit- 
izens; but the anger of the people and the rage of 
the monks persecuted the unfortunate ones even into 
their very houses. They lived in constant fear; but 
this kept the fire of piety the more activ in all hearts. 
Compelled, and for name’s sake, we visited the 
church of the Catholics, celebrated their holidays, 
and kept the pictures of their saints in our rooms. 
Yet neither this concession nor the laborious piety 
of the persecuted assuaged the hatred of the per- 
secutor. 


100 


AIAMONTADA. 


CHAPTER IV. 

Suspended between two cburcbes, the one of 
which I had to confess openly, the other secretly, 
daily witness of the hard quarrels of both parties, 
and how pride and hatred and egotism, more than 
forbearance and piety, were written on the banner (;f 
contending churches, I became, without knowing: it, 
a hypocrit and doubter of both. The arguments 
with which each attacked the disputed doctrins of 
the other were more thoroughly weighed, shjarper, 
and more elfectiv than those with which they de- 
fended themselvs. This awakened in me suspicion 
of all doctrins of faith ; only the newly attacked ones 
retained in my mind lasting wm*th. Yet I concealed 
my thoughts in order not to become an abhorrence 
to all. 

So my spirit was early left to itself. In unoccu- 
pied hours God and his creation were the topic of my 
thoughts. The insanity of mankind with which they 
persecuted each other on account of changing opin- 
ion, or carried on war with one another on account 
of the title of their princes, was to me a horror. I 
became early aware of my hard fate, to be compelled 
to liv among beings who thought in all things differ- 
ently from myself. I saw myself burrounded by 
barbarians or half-civilized, not yet much more hu- 
mane than those at whose human sacrifices we shud- 
der. If the old Celts, or the Brahmans, or the sav- 
ages of the American plains made human sacrifices 
on the altars of their gods, were^they more terrible 
in their doings than the modern Europeans, when 
they on the altar of their gods (and opinions are the 


ALAMONTADA. 101 

gorls of mortals), slaughter thousands of their breth- 
ren in pious zeal ? 

I lamented the cruelty of my time, and saw no 
means by which to make the general barbarism of 
nations disappear. The brutal nature of man is 
everywhere predominant. Food, sexual desires, and 
greediness for power are, as with every species of 
animals, the mightiest spurs to action, the sources of 
agreement and disagreement, the rising and falling 
of nations. Unselfish virtue, eternal right, and in- 
destructible truth are more imagined than recognized 
and taken to heart. Their names resound in the 
school-rooms without always penetrating the being 
of the teacher. And he who with holy zeal would 
dare to profess them would soon become a laugh- 
ing-stock for the bystanders, the victim of general 
insanity. That was thy fate, Jesus Christ, thou only, 
thou high one ! Thou wast misapprehended by thy 
enemies, but still more by thy followers up to this 
day. 

Yet altogether too painful for me was the gloomy 
present. I longed for the nobler and more perfect. 
In life’s period of sparkling fancy it could not be 
otherwise, but that I built for myself a more beauti- 
ful world, in which virtue, right, and truth embraced 
each other, and sensuality transplanted there its 
sweetest emotions. 


102 


ALAMONTADA. 


CHAPTER V. 

The ruins of the immense amphitheater at JVismes, 
the old magnificent monument of Roman grandeur, 
were my favorit retreat. When I walked through 
the high-arched corridors between the gray pillars, 
or looked down upon the grand ruins from the ele- 
vated attic, then it .seemed to me as if the spirit of 
majestic antiquity embraced me, and pressed me 
lamenting to its bosom. 

Here I loved to tarry, but never without melan- 
choly. The remains of races long since perished be- 
came to me a book of history. This magniheent 
Roman work the hands of several nations hav re- 
paired. The two half-crumbled towers upon the 
attic, solitary piled up masses of stone, without taste 
and sense of art, were erected by the conquerors of 
the Romans, the Goths. And the wooden huts 
below, in the wide arena, are the dwelling-places of 
poor day laborers and workers in factories of our 
day. What a change of time and its companions ! 

The cry for help of a female here under the arches 
one evening scared me out of my dream. It was 
already dusk in the corridors. I hurried down the 
steps from the second story, and perceived the form of 
a well-dressed female in the power of a mean, low 
fellow. The sound of my footsteps made the 
scoundrel timid. He disappeared between the pil- 
lars. A young girl with torn hair sat on a marble 
block, trembling and beside herself. 

“Has any one injured you ?” asked I. 

She felt of her head. “ He was a robber, sir; he 
has robbed me of my hair ornaments, some set hair- 
pins of value, nothing else. I beg you take me 


ALAMONTADA. 


loa 

onder your pTotection. I am a etratiger here. 
Cariosity led me away from mother and sister. They 
await me outside. That fellow was to conduct me 
back out of this wide labyrinth, and he led me into 
this remote place.” 

I offered her my arm. We stepped into the light. 
O Clementine ! 

She was a blossom of sixteen years, tender and 
beautifully grown. She walked beside me with 
fairy-like step. The loveliness, freshness, and spirit- 
ed ness of her countenance was angelic, and her look 
full of innocence and love penetrated my inmost 
soul. 

1 lost myself in an agreeable confusion. Never 
before had I experienced such a feeling of admira- 
tion and confidence, of uns]:>eakable attraction and 
reverence. I was twenty-one years of age, and knew 
love only from the pictures of old poets and called 
it passionate friendship, unworthy of the name. 
Ah ! it was certainly something else. 

Love is the poetry of human nature. The feeling 
of 1 eaiity ennobles the low sensuality and elevates it 
to touch the spiritual ; and the virtuous, independent 
spirit weds itself under the enchanting hue of loveli- 
ness to the earthly. So it is true that love makes 
the dust godlike and brings down the heavenly to 
the earth. 

You are a stranger?” stammered I. 

Certainly,” answered she, “ but it is in vain that 
we look for mother and sister. Do you know the 
house of Mr. Albertas ? There we liv.” 

I escort you there.” 

We turned about. What a change ! The narrow, 
black streets of Nismes were no longer prison walls, 


104 


ALAMONTADA. 


but shiruDg clouds, and tbe people moved liked 
shadows through them. 

We did not speak. We reached home. The door 
was joyfully opened. The whole family crowded 
around us to welcome the loved lost one, who was 
stili sought by servants sent in search of lier. Then 
I heard under the thousands of caresses the name 
Clementine. She thanked me with few words and 
blushed; the same did all the rest. But I could not 
reply anything. I was asked my name ; I named it, 
bowed, and left the company. 


CBI AFTER VI 

Often I was in the amphitheater; often I passed 
through the street of Albertas. I saw her no more. 
Her picture floated before me and mixed itself with 
my dreams. 1 lost all hope to see the beautiful vis- 
ion again, but not my longing. 

The time came that I was to enter the university at 
Montpellier. Mr. Etienne repeated to me his wishes 
and conjured me not to disappoint his expectations. 
In the superabundance of his confidence in my young 
powers he saw in me the future guardian angel of the 
Protestant church of France. 

He blessed me. The whole family stood weeping 
around me at my departure. I promised in all vaca- 
tions to come to Nismes, and left, overwhelmed 
with grief. 

From Nismes to Montpellier are eight full leagues. 
I wandered in the shade of mulberry-trees between 
golden grain and beautiful wine-gardens along the 
chain of hills above which rise the gray Ce venues. 


ALAMONTADA.. 


105 


But the air glowed, and the earth burned beneath 
my feet. After three hours I sank down, worn out 
at the banks of the Vidourle, in the shade of a neat 
villa and its chestnut-trees. 

I meditated over my past and my future. I calcu- 
lated what I had lived, and what a space of time, ac- 
cording to the common measure, would yet be left 
for me to labor. I found still forty years, and for 
the first time shuddered at the shortness of our days. 
The oak upon the mountain needs for its development 
a century, and stands yet another in the prime of its 
strength. And man’s existence so lleeting ! And 
why? What shall he do with his numerous talents? 
Not a long, but a rich life was by nature given to 
man. The thought consoled me. Well then, thought 
I, four decades more, and thou standest, a more per- 
fect one, where thy father stands. 

So I gradually fell asleep under these thoughts. 
In my dream I was an aged man, my limbs heaviei’, 
my hair white. The thousands of fine pores of the 
physical body, through which it unfelt inhales power 
of life, and nourishes itself from the elements, had 
withered. With the ceasing flow of the matter of 
life ceased the power of the muscles, and the tender 
parts, which we call its tools, gradually hardened ant^ 
closed themselvs. I heard the world no longer, and 
soon my eyesight also became extinct. While thus 
the senses died away with which the spirit takes 
root in the earthly the emotions grew weaker, all 
perceptions feebler, and all that which was formerly 
conducted through the busy senses to the spirit was 
lost. I had my corpse no longer under full control, 
and forgot the names of things and their use. I wis 
fed by others, an I dre^se I and undrjssed, and treated 


106 


ALA3IONTADA. 


as children are treated. I could yet talk, but the 
words often failed me, and I spoke sometimes that 
which nobody could comprehend. Yet I thought 
and felt, though without regret, that I no longer be- 
longed to the earth. But soon I did not even think 
any more in words; it was only a motionless, still, 
nominal feeling of my being. This being, eternally 
monotonous, with entire absence of anything from 
without, was without weal and without woe; there 
was in it no change of thought, hence no results, and 
no more time. Enough ! I was dead long ago, my 
corpse a long, long time buried and moldered for 
centuries. Only upon earth, where we count the 
changes of things, are centuries, and the succession 
of events produces in us the idea of time. Separated 
from all change, there is in existence no time. 

An agreeable, dark sensation now took possession 
of me. My hitherto isolated spirit became con- 
nected with new instruments, to be working in the 
universe upon the universe. I felt gradually more 
distinct, and heard a mild rustling, and felt an 
agreeable freshness about me. Before me floated 
golden, dazzling beams, and silvery clouds danced 
along. I lowered the astonished look into the 
bright, transparent green of trees surrounding me, 
which, like colored air, swam in the crystal-clea 
ether. And between the branches and the clouds 
stood Clementine, motionless, shining brilliantly in 
unspeakable beauty, a wreath of young flowers about 
her dark hair. 

She smiled at me. So smiles only love in its 
innocence. She took the wreath from out her hair, 
and swung it in her tender hand, and it sank upon 
my breast. 


ALAMONTADA. 


107 


”0 thou heavenly dream, do not leave me!” 
thought I, and stared in nameless rapture at tho 
beautiful vision. 

At this I heard a sound, as of a wagon rolling by. 
Clementine’s countenance darkened. Her name was 
called. 

“ Farewell, Alamontada !” said she, and vanished 
among the trembling twigs. 

I was at that moment about to sink at her feet. 
But I lay upon the ground. I was not in a dream, 
for I recognized the Vidourle and the villa darkened 
by high chestnut-trees. 

I raised myself up. A wagon thundred over tho 
bridge. I hurried thither. An old servant met me, 
and asked whether I desired refreshments. I ex- 
pressed my astonishment to him. ‘‘Are you not 
Mr. Alamontada V” said he. I replied in the affirm- 
ativ. “Now, Miss de Sonnes and her mother hav 
left the order with me,” answered he. I went back, 
took Clementine’s wreath from the ground, and 
followed the servant. Clementine was Miss do 
Sonnes. 

This day will never be forgotten as one of the 
most beautiful of my life. 


CHAPTER Vn 

_ An attic room in the rear house of one of the 
richest and happiest inhabitants of Montpellier, 
Mr. Bertollon, became my abode. Some roofs, black 
walls, and two windows, and the attic of a bouse 
standing on the opposit street, was my scanty view. 
Nevertheless I was happy. Surrounded by my 
books, I lived only for the i^ciences, and Clemeu- 


108 


ALAilONTADA. 


tine’s wreath bung above my writing-desk. Spring’s 
myriads of blossoms lost their brightness beside the 
charms of these withered üowers, and the weight of 
the queen’s jewels could not pay me the value of the 
slightest citron leaf thereof. 

Clementine became my saint. I loved her with a 
pious veneration — as one loves supernatural beings. 
The suspended wreath was my relic, which an angel 
had thrown down to me from heaven. I saw her, 
in the glory of transfiguration, go through my 
dreams. ITer name resounded in my songs. I 
awaited with trembling and longing the vacation of 
the university, in order to see my uncle Etienne and 
Nismes, and perhaps through some lucky accident 
to see the loved saint again. 


I 


One day the door of my study-room was opened. 
A young, handsome man entered to inspect the room. 
It was ]\[r. Bertollon. “ You hav here an unpleasant 
view!” said he, and stepped to the window; “yet 
yonder still a little piece of the house of De Sonnes, 

one of the most tasteful in the whole city !”he added 
smilingly. 

The name Do Sonnes made me tremble. Mr. Ber- 
tollon remained meditatingly at the window and ap- 
peared to become sad. I began a conversation. lie 
asked me about my origin and my knowledge. 
“How,” said he, “you play the harp? And you 
love it passionately, without possessing an instru- 
ment?” 


“I am too poor, sir, to buy one myself. My little 
money is hardly sufficient for the necessary books.” 

“ My wife has two harps. She can wf^ll do with- 
put one of them !” he answered, and left me. 

Withiu an hour the harp came, How happy was 


ÄLAMONTADA. 


109 


I ! Now I thouglit of Clementine and touched the 
strings. Emotions are speechless; for thoughts the 
proper words hav been invented; for the feelings of 
the heart, melodious sounds. 

The following morning came the amiable Bertol- 
lon. I thanked him moved. He asked me to play. 

I played and thought of Clementine. He leaned 
with his forehead against the window and stared 
gloomily over the roofs. My soul drowned in the 
abundance of harmonies. I did not notice that ho 
turned around and listening stood near me. 

“You are a dear enchanter !” exclaimed he, and 
embraced me with violence; “we two must become 
friends ! ” 

I was his already; we became so still more in the 
course of a few weeks. In fine weather I had to ac- 
company him on all his little pleasure rides, lie in- 
troduced me to numerous af quaintances. Every one 
treated me with respect and distinction. He was the 
owner of a respectable library and a rich natural 
collection. He entrusted to me the management of 
these, and seemed to hav chosen this means only to 
relieve my poverty through a considerable salary 
for the little trouble without offending my feelings. 

Bertollon was, in more than one respect, an excel- 
lent man. He possessed knowledge, wit, and power 
of persuasion; he charmed through his gentleness 
and goodness; in companies he was the genius of 
joy; his aim was the respect of his fellow-citizens. 
He had already declined several public offices with a 
modesty that made him still more worthy of the gen- 
eral confidence. He was very rich, copartner of a 
large raercantil house, possessed one of the most 
agreeable villas on the bights of the opposite villag*’, 


110 


ALAMONTADA. 


Costelnau, and was the husband of the most beauti- 
ful wife of Montpellier. Generally his wife lived iu 
the villa ; only in winter she removed to the town. 
Bertollon saw her seldom. Not love, but conven- 
ience and interest seemed to hav closed this alliance. 

What to me made this man of still more impor- 
tance was his being free from all prejudices. Bigotry 
and religious fanaticism pervaded the whole town; 
only he made a rare exception. Nevertheless, he 
visited most regularly the masses, and was even 
member of the brotherhood of the penitent. “’Tis 
such a little,” said he, to win the favor of mankind. 
If one only does homage to their prejudices, if he 
cannot attack and conquer them, he. is the man 
of all hearts. He who makes open war upon the 
prejudices is just as much an enthusiast as the one 
who defends them with all weapons.” 

We, notwithstanding, often had our friendly quar- 
rels. He termed the destiny of man blissfulness, and 
knew no limits to the selection of the means to this 
end. He mocked at my lively zeal for virtue, called 
it a work of social regulation, and proved to me that 
it, among different nations, also bears different colors. 
Plis wit sometimes even made me ridiculous in my 
own eyes, while he suffered one of my principal vir- 
tues to wander to different nations and everywhere 
ridiculed it. 

And yet Bertollon was, in spite of these preju- 
dices, dear to me ; for everywhere he did good. 


ALAiTONTADA. 


1X1 


CHAPTER VIII. 

While I thus dedicated my hours to the muses and 
friendship, the windows and the attic of the palace 
De Sonnes were not forgotten. Mr. Bertollon had 
frequently offered to me in exchange for my little 
attic room one elegantly furnished and with a wide, 
pleasant view. But not for his grandest state-room, 
not for the view upon a paradise of Languedoc, 
would I hav exchanged that poor little attic room. 

Accident— for I was prevented from making in- 
quiry by a strange bashfulness — revealed to me that 
the family De Sonnes were expected back in a few 
weeks, and that they were in deep mourning over tlio 
recent death of Clementine’s sister. 

And the few weeks, and three months passed. As 
often as I touched the harp my eye was fasten(*d 
upon the dear walls. But the family De Sonnes did 
not return, and no accident informed me why. But 
I was silent, and hid ray loving heart from the world. 

The vacation of the university came. I flew to 
Nismes, in hope to be more fortunate there. When 
I passed by the villa on the Vidourle I stopped. All 
was locked up, although the fields and bill-sides were 
alive with grain-cutters and grape-gatherers. Then 
T sought the enchanting place beneath the chestnuts, 
where once dream and reality had so charming’ y 
intermingled. I threw myself down under the wav- 
ing branches, upon the same spot which once Clem- 
entine’s foot had consecrated, as it were, through its 
touch. Love and sentimentality drew me down. I 
kissed the sanctified ground that had borne all that 
was dear to me in this world. 


112 


ALAMONTADA. 


Alas ! in vain I hoped for the appearance of an 
an.^el. It had grown evening already, as I left the 
beautiful place, and above the dusky-growing plains 
only the rocky peaks of the Cevennes sparkled 
golden red. 

Mr. Etienne, and the pious mother, and Mary, An- 
tonia, and Susan, the three daughters, received me 
with touching joy. I sank from heart to heart, 
speechless and happy, and knew not by whom I was 
more deeply loved, and whom I loved the most. I 
was the son and brother of this family; was in my 
home, and the joy of them all. 

“ Yes, thou art the joy of us all,” exclaimed Mr. 
Etienne, moved. “And the hope of our church. 
All news from Montpellier has praised thy diligence, 
and how thy teachers esteem thee. Continue, O 
Colas, continue to stengthen thyself, for our suffer- 
ings are great, and the misery of the faithful has no 
end. God calls thee. Become his chosen armor, to 
break the power of antichrist, and to triumphantly 
lift from the dust the down-trodden gospel.” 

The fears of my uncle had lately been increased 
through hard expressions against the secret Protest- 
ants from the first magistrate of the province. The 
Marshal de Montreval resided in Nisnies, and the 
mightier and more dreaded became this man, as ho 
possessed the unbounded confidence of the king. Ilis 
threats against the Huguenots were carried from 
mouth to mouth ; every street-boy hallooed it at the 
other. 

But I was tormented by another trouble. In vain 
had I daily passed through the street of Albertas, in 
vain had I wandered through the amphitheater. 
Clementine was nowhere visible. 


ALAMONTADA. 


113 


On the street one morning I met the old servant, 
who had, by order of Madame de Sonnes, enter- 
tained me at the villa on the Vidoiirle. lie recog- 
iiized me; he shook my hand heartily, and related to 
mo after a thousand other things Madame de Sonnes 
and her daughter were for the last few months not 
in Nismes, but in Marseilles, in order to quiet the 
intense grief over the loss of a d early-beloved child 
and sister in the diversions of this large commercial 
city. 

So with lost hope to catch even a momentary 
glimps of Clementine from afar I went sadly home. 
The joyful expectation which had nourished me 
through the full half of a year was disappointed. 
I made plans to go to Marseilles — it was only three 
days journey thither — and there I would wander 
from street to street, and examin window after win- 
dow, and visit all churches and attend all masses, if 
by these means I could see her only one moment’s 
time. Could she not for so much trouble grant n»3 
one friendly look? 

But cool consideration soon destroyed this advent- 
urous plan. And the more downcast I entered the 
house of Mr. Etienne. 

With surprise I noticed here also, in all faces, an 
unusual embarrassment and unquietness. The 
mother stepped up to me, laid her hand on my 
shoulder, and kissed me, with a look of sympathy. 
Mary and Antonia and Susan took my hand friendly 
in theirs, as if they wished to console me. 

‘‘What is it, then?” asked Mr. Etienne, with 
strong, proud voice. He had at any rate, in spite of 
his pious appearance, something heroic in his charac- 
ter. “ You know that a good Christian should bo 


114 


alamontada. 


the happiest, then, when the waves of misfortune 
clash together the wildest. The devil has no power 
over us, and Providence has counted every hair of 
our heads. The marshal is not beyond the power of 
the Lord.” 

I made known my astonishment about all this. 
“Surely thou art right, Colas,” said the old man; 
“and it vexes me the faint-heartedness of the 
women. The Lord Marshal de Montreval has sent 
here an hour ago and commanded thee to make thy 
appearance to-morrow morning at ten o’clock in the 
castle. Now thou knowestit. And what else now? 
Is it well with thy conscience, then go to the mar- 
shal without fear, and were the court of his castle 
the open jaws of hell.” 

Naturally could this direct command from so high 
a person scare this simple, quiet miller’s family. 
Rarely the marshal showed himself to the peo])le, 
and even then accompanied by a large escort of 
officers, noblemen, and guards. The outward pomp 
of the great one exercises upon the minds of the 
great uneducated mass more fear than their power. 

The mother had, with trembling hands, next 
morning arranged my clothes. I soothed, with all 
consolation, the dear, sorrowful ones. “ It is ten 
o’clock,” exclaimed Mr. Etienne. “Go, in God’s 
name. We pray for thee.” 

I went. 

The Marshal de Montreval was in his cabinet. 
After more than an hour and a half I was led 
through a row of chambers and halls to him. An 
elderly gentleman,- somewhat spare, with comm and - 
ing dignity, of dark complexion, and sharp, pene- 
trating eyes, came a few steps forward. The rever- 


ALAMONTADA. 


115 


ence of the bystanders pointed him out to me as the 
marshal. 

“ I wish to see you, Alamontada,” said the mar- 
shal, “ as you on the register of the University of 
Montpellier are so distinguished by praise. Culti- 
vate your talents, you can become a useful man, and 
I will in the future provide for you. My encourage- 
ment must not make you proud, but more industrious. 
I shall further inquire after you. Do all you can to 
retain the friendship of your well-wisher, Bertollon, 
and tell him that I hav called you to me.” 

This it was that the marshal said to me. After a 
little conversation he seemed to be pleased with me. 
I commended myself to his grace, and hurried to 
console my anxiously-awaiting family. 

The joy was great. Soon all the neighbors and 
the whole town must know it, what honor the mar- 
shal had bestowed upon me. “ Did not I say it?” 
cried Mr Etienne. “ God it is who rules the hearts 
of the powerful. Out of the night arises the sun, 
and above the crushed serpent and the thorns of 
suffering towers the cross toward heaven.” 


CHAPTER IX. 

Mr. Bertollon had gone to visit his wife in the 
country when I arrived in Montpellier. Not without 
sadness I stood in my attic room before the withered 
wreath. I sighed Clementine’s name, and kissed the 
dry leaves which once blossomed beneath her tender 
fingers. I wanted to be ashamed of tears, which 
disappointed hope drove to my eyes, and yet 1 felt 
relieved through them. 


116 


ALAMONTADA. 


The wrea".h and the small part of the magnificent 
house of Dc Sonnes should, through the winter, be- 
come again the mute witnesses of my joys, my hopes. 
“Perhaps spring will bring her, together with its 
flowers, to Montpellier,” said I to myself, and looked 
over to the palace which should then contain her. 

There stood at ore of the high windows opposit a 
female figure, wrapped in black crape, her back 
turned to mo My pulse stopped, my breath ceased, 
it grew daii^ before my eyes. “That can be only 
Clementine ! ” it spoke within me ; but strengthless I 
sunk down, lying in the window, and had not the 
courage and not the power to look over and seek 
certainty. 

When I had re-collected my strength I raised my- 
self up and stealthily threw a look over. Her face 
was turned toward me, surrounded by a black veil. 
The breeze played in the folds of the veil; it was 
raised — I saw Clementine, and in a moment, in 
which I seemed to hav attracted her attention. 

I cast down my eyes. A fire never before felt 
burned in my veins. I thought I must sink into the 
ground. And when again I looked over she had dis- 
appeared from the window, but not from my inmost 
look. 

“It is she!” it resounded in me, and I stood on 
the very hight of human blissfulness, alone, only 
Clementine’s picture before me. A golden glitter 
flowed over the gray walls, and above the barren 
roofs floated a rich sea of flowers. The world under 
me vanished like a shining cloud. The form of 
Clementine went through the lovely eternity, and I 
was beside Clementine, and my lot nanudess en- 
chantment. “Ah! what blissfulness is the human 


ALAMO^JTADA. 


117 


heart capable of ! ” cried I, and sunk down upon iny 
knees and raised my hands toward heaven, crying 
aloud, “ O God ! for what hours hast thou preserved 
me ! O make this emotion everlasting ! 


CIIAPTEU X. 

It was Clementine. In the eve.ning beamed the 
windows with light, and I saw her figure float by 
them. 

When it was late, I took the harp, and in its 
sounds my feelings gradually grew calmer. 

The next morning I awoke late. Sleepless for me 
the night had passed. When I stepped to the win- 
dow Clementine was already in hers in her morning 
robe. I bowed to her; my salutation was hardly 
noticeably returned. But still she looked friendly up 
again. As long as she was in her window, I also 
was bound to mine ; sometimes our bashful looks 
met. My soul spoke to her, and to me it seemed as 
if I heard low answers. 

O blessed hours, which I dreamed away harmless 
.in stolen glances. Poor and of low descent as I, 
and without beingable to lay claim to handsomeness, 
with which I could please, how dared I to raise my 
hopes up to the most amiable and richest heiress of 
Montpellier, for whose favor the richest youths in 
the country wooed ? 

And how gladly tarry my thoughts in the memory 
of those days ! Friendship and love are the prop- 
erty of mortals only ; he does not shaie them with 
the beasts. Friendship and love, childien of the 
amalgamation of the human and godlike in as, are 


118 


ALA MON-TAD A. 


the crowns of humanity. We are more pious, more 
faithful, more regardful, more at home in the uni- 
verse, and more self-reliant then ; and we endure 
the thorns along the wayside, and also a wilderness 
shines brightly in the glitter of a fantasy burning 
quietly in love. 

In the evening I took the harp from the corner 
and made the strings resound. I played the “ Suf- 
ferings of Count Peter de Provence, and the loved 
Magellone,” at that time one of the newest, most 
celebrated, and touching ballads, full of expressiv 
melody. When I had ended the first stanza, and 
rested my hand for a moment, there came back to 
me the low sound of a harp through the stillness of 
the night playing the same piece. Who else could 
it be than Clementine, who seemed to hav the desire 
to become the echo of my own emotions ? When 
she had ended, I began again. So we changed alter- 
nately. Music is the language of the soul. What 
an unspeakable delight for my heart ; Clementine 
deemed me worthy of conversation ! 

Ah, thousands of nameless little things, which 
only receive their immense value through the sense 
in which they are given and accepted, I must pass 
with silence ; but they are unforgotten. Even the 
corpse of the beautiful dream of youth, remembrance 
is, although lifeless, always charming. 

And so the dream lasted two years. For two 
years we saw ourselvs silent and loving, and spoke 
together through the voice of the strings, and never 
approached each other. I knew the church in which 
she prayed. There I was also and prayed with her. 
I knew the days, when she, accompanied by her 
mother and her lady friends, went walking under 


ALÄMO^JTADA. 


119 . 


the shade trees of the Peyrou; there I was also. 
Her look recognized me then and rewarded me tim- 
idly. 

Without having spoken once to each other daring 
this long time, we had gradually become the greatest 
confidants. We disclosed to each other our joy and 
our sorrow ; we begged and granted and hoped and 
feared, made vows to each other and broke them 
never. 

Nobody fancied the intercourse of our souls, our 
intimacy. Only Mr. BertoUon’s kindness often 
exposed me to the danger of losing all my joys. 
He wanted by all means to giv me better rooms ; 
not without effort I secured for myself the further 
possession of the attic room. 


CHAPTER XL 

When Madame Bertollon had returned from the 
villa her husband introduced me to her. 

“ Piere,” said he, “ is Alamontada, a youth whom 
I love as my friend, and whom I wish nothing but 
that he may become yours also.” 

Fame had not spoken too much about her. She 
was very beautiful, scarcely twenty years old, and 
could serve artists as ideal for Madonnas. An 
agreeable timidity beautified her the more. The 
fewer of her sex and class in Montpellier even knew 
the refined modesty without which amiability loses 
all charms. 

She spoke little, but well. She appeared cold, but 
the loveliness and brightness of her looks betrayed a 
feeling heart, an activ mind. She was a benefactress 
of all poor, and the whole town honored her. Neg- 
lected by her husband, worshiped by young, hand- 


120 


ALA3r02MTADA. 


some men of the best families, could slinder never- 
theless discover no blemish in the purity of her 
morals. She lived an almost hermlt-like life. I my- 
self saw her rarely. Only in the last year of my 
study at the university a sickness of her husband 
caused us to meet often in his room. 

The tender care about the health of her husband 
could be read in all her features. She was inces- 
santly busy for him. She prepared for him the med- 
icins, she read to him, and when the disease had 
reached its crisis she did not leave his bed; through 
continued night watches she destroyed her own health. 

Mr, BertoUon after his recovery remained the same 
in his coldness and politeness toward her. Her kind- 
ness remained unanswered. She appeared to feel 
his indifference deeply, and gradually became more 
and more distant from him as his health returned. 
I could do nothing but pity her and reproach my 
friend. 

“But what dost thou want, Colas?” cried he, “art 
thou master of thy heart, that thou darest to demand 
obedience of mine ? If it pleaseth thee, well, I will 
agree with thee, my wife is beautiful; but empty 
beauty is only a pleasing shimmer, under which the 
heart remains cold. Why do we not fall in love 
with the masterpieces of sculptors? I own up to 
thee she is intellectual; that one usually does not 
love, but at the highest admire. She is very benev. 
olent; but she has money enough, and takes no 
pleasure in costly entertainments. She has shown, 
during my sickness, much attention to me. I am 
grateful to her. bfothing shall be wanting to her 
that she wishes and I am able to giv. But the heart 
cannot be given — it must be won! Moreover, 


ALAMONTADA. 


121 


ffiend, tbou knowest her too little. She also has 
her weaknesses, and, with thy permission, her faults. 
But now if unfortunately among these faults one or 
the other were of such a kind that it from necessity 
would extinguish in my breast every germ of affec- 
tion, what then could I be blamed for, if I could not 
change stone into gold, and an alliance for conven- 
ience into a cause of the heart ? ” 

“But never, dear Bertollon, never discovered I 
even the slightest trace of such a great fault.” 

“ Because thou knowest not my wife. To thee, as 
my friend, I might as well reveal what in the very 
first days of our married life made me forever dis- 
tant from her. It is her ungovernable, senseless, 
raging, her all-destroying, passion. Trust not the 
ice and snow of the outer appearance; a volcano 
boils below, which must from time to time send forth 
flames, if it shall not burst its encasement. She is 
quiet, and therefore the more dangerous. Each of 
her emotions takes a long time before it exhibits it- 
self, but then it is unquenchable and all-destroying. 
She seems to be virtue personified, and the very soul 
of kindness; without her unfortunate disposition she 
might become a saint. But this destroys every- 
thing better. I hav caught her already in ideas so 
horrid, so frightful, that one cannot comprehend how 
one of them could steal into the soul of a woman, or 
how she could harbor it. And in this manner, 
friend, no heart can be gained.” 

These confidential revelations shook me the more, 
as I had myself already experienced Bertollon’s 
knowledge of human character and his correct, pen- 
etrating eye. I meanwhile did not cease to continue 
the intercourse with Madame Bertollon in oftener 


122 


ÄLA^iaXTADA. 


repeater! calls. I thought to notice thnt fTio founrl 
pleasure in conversing with me. But she w ia al- 
ways the calm, patient, gentle one. So much Iw^anty 
and so much mildness changed my reverence into 
hearty friendship. I made the resolution to, at any 
cost, unite her again with her husband, or rather to 
lead him back into her arms. 


CHAPTER XII. 

The habit of meeting daily gradually freed us 
from trcublesome etiquet, and made the society of 
Madame Bertollon a necessity for me. 

“ You are Bertollon’s first friend and confidant,” 
said she once when she, leaning on my arm, prom- 
enaded up and down in the garden near the house. 
“ I also consider you my friend, and your character 
givs me a right to your kindness. Speak frankly, 
Alamontada. You know it. Why does Bertollon 
hate me 

“He does not hate you, Madame. He is full of 
the highest esteem for you. Hate ? He must be a 
monster if he could do that. No, and he is a noble 
man. He can hate nobody.” 

“ You are right. He can hate nobody, because ho 
can love nobody. He does not belong to the whole 
world, and to nobody ; the whole world and every- 
body belong only to him. Never, perhaps, has 
education poisoned a heart richer in feeling and a 
more talented head than his.” 

“ You judge, perliaps, too harshly, Madame.” 


I 


ALAMONTADA. llj 

Ob, would to heaven I did ! I entreat you, con- 
vert me.” 

“I convert you? Not so, Madame. Watch your 
husband and you will change your mind.” 

“ I watch ? I always did that, and always he is 
the same.” 

‘‘At least a good, amiable man.” 

“ Amiable ? He is that. He knows it, and takes 
pains to be so ; yet it is a pity, not for others, but to 
make himself happy. On that account I cannot call 
him good, and yet he is not bad.” 

“Certainly, Madame, I do not understand you 
fully. But permit me to return your contldence 
with confidence. Never yet hav I known two per- 
sons who deserve so much to be happy and so fit to 
be so, one through the other, as you and your hus- 
band. And yet both stand separated ! Certainly I 
believe to hav lived and done enough in this world 
if I could reunite you both with each other in the 
strongest love and bring your distant hearts to- 
gether.” 

“ You are very kind. But in spite of your work 
being already half done, for my heart has long fol- 
lowed his, which flees from mine, so, I fear, you de- 
sire an impossibility. But if one should be success- 
ful in this, you would be the one. You, Alamontada, 
are the first one to whom Bertollon surrenders him- 
self so entirely — on whom he lays so solid a hold. 
Try it; change the man’s mind.” 

“You joke. Change him. What virtue do you 
yet demand that Bertollon should exercise ? He is 
generous, modest, the protector of innocence, always 
of the same temper, without conspicuous passion, 
publicly useful, friendly—’» 


124 


ALAMO N’TADA. 


“ You are right. That all he is.” 

“And how shall I change him ?” 

“ Make a better man of him.” 

“A better man!” replied I, astonished, and 
stopped and looked perplexedly into the eyes of lini 
beautiful woman, which glistened witli a tear. 
“ Why, is he bad ? Is he vic-ious ?” 

“ That Bertollon is not,” she answered ; “ but he 
is not good.” 

“And yet, Madame, you admit he possesses all the 
beautiful qualities which I before praised in him? 
Do you not, perhaps, ask too much of a mortal ?” 

“ What you hav praised in him, Alamontada, hav 
I not denied. But these are not his qualities; they 
are only his tools. He does much good, but not 
because it is good, but because it is profitable to 
him. He is not virtuous, but prudent. He sees in 
all acts only the useful or the hurtful; never the 
good and the bad. He would just as soon use hell 
as heaven full of virtues to the accomplishment of 
his aims. He places happiness in reaching that 
which he desires, and for that he is and does what 
under the given circumstances may be expedient. 
The world to him is a play-ground of desires, wherein 
all belongs to the luckiest and most cunning one. 
The throng of people living together created, as he 
believes, states and laws, religion and practices. 
The wisest one, in his opinion, is he who knows even 
the finest thread of the entangled net of circum- 
stances; and he who knows this is capable of all. 
Considered by itself, nothing is right, nothing 
wrong. Opinion alone sanctifies and damns. Be- 
hold, Alamontada, this is my husband. He cannot 
love me, for he loves only himself. His mind and 
taste change, and accordingly his manners. With 


ALAMOJJTADA. 


125 


iron zeal he follows up and reaches his aims. He is 
the son of a distinguished family, but which'« had 
sunk down from the hight of former wealth. He 
wanted to become rich, became a merchant, disap- 
peared in distant regions, and came back as the 
master of a million. He wished to secure his 
wealth through an alliance with one of the most dis- 
tinguished families of this city. I became his wife. 
He wished to hav influence in public affairs without 
awakening envy. He made himself popular, and 
declined the first places of honor. Nothing, by his 
manner of thinking, is beyond his reach. He knows 
no sanctity. He overpowers everything. Nobody 
is strong enough for him, because everyone is weak 
through some kind of an inclination, or passion, or 
opinion.” 

This picture of Bertollon’s manner of thinking 
startled me. I found it in all features similar to the 
' original. Never before had I in my own mind 
raised all that to a clear understanding, although it 
lay darkly hidden in my feelings. 

I discovered the immense abyss which separated 
the hearts of this couple, and despaired to fill it up. 

“But, Madame,” said I, and pressed, moved, the 
hand of the beautiful unfortunate, “ do not despair. 
Your untiring love, your virtue, will finally fasten 
him.” 

“Virtue? O dear Alamontada, what may one 
hope of this man, who calls virtue weakness, or one- 
sidedness of character, or prudery of the mind ; 
who considers religion merely a business of church 
and education, wherewith the fancy of the bashful 
plays with child like zeal?” 

“ But he has a heart, this man !” 


ALAMONTADA 


1 ‘ 2(3 

Ho has a heart, but he has it for himself only, 
and not for others. He wants to be loved, but with- 
out returning it. Ah, and can such a one be loved ? 
No, Alamontada, love demands more. It surrenders 
itself entirely to the loved one, and livs in him, and 
is no longer mistress of itself. It cares not, it counts 
not, and it risks whether it will finally be blessed by 
truthfulness or strangled by treachery. Hut hope- 
less it will not be. It demands the heart of the 
other, and therein even lies its paradise.” 


CHAPTER XIII 

“ And therein even lies its paradise !” sighed I 
when I stood in my room, and thought of Clementine. 

I took the withered wreath down and hung it on 
the harp. It had been thus far to me the sacred 
pledge of Clementine’s favor. Had she not hers<df 
thrown it upon ray breast, that contains the loving 
heart? Hid she not then seem to wish to crown 
this with her own hand? Could it bavbeen only 
childish playfulness? Ah! could it hav been the 
same to her if it had been a crown of thorns, or a 
wreath of blossoms, which she drew around the 
heart ? 

She was at the window. I lifted up the wreath 
and held it against my lips. She seemed to recog- 
nize it. She hid a smile, leaned out of the window, 
looked down into the street and no more over to me. 

This answer plunged me into unspeakable inqui- 
etude. It seemed to me as if she were ashamed of the 
recollection of having once given me that present. 
Now, all at once, it was clear to me, what I asked, 


ALÄSklONTADA. 


157 


what I hoped. I longed for the impossible. Never 
had I fancied to myself Clementine as wife. I only 
loved her and wished to be loved by her. But, wife? 
I, the poor son of a peasant that had died in debt — 
I, who still had to battle with want, and only saw 
before me an uncertain fate in the future — I was 
asking Montpellier’s richest heiress. 

My proud courage sank. I loved Clementine, but 
pardoned her if she could not return my love. I be- 
came aware that I could not change the conditions 
of human society, and was in reality too proud to 
make my outer fortune through the hand of a woman. 

More zealously thereafter I pursued my studies. 
I would through my own strength make my way to 
Clementine’s hights. Nights I watched through 
among my books. I wanted to hear the unrestrained 
opinion of experts about my talents, and caused to 
appear, anonymously, a work on the Jurisprudence 
of the older nations, and at the same time a collec- 
tion of poems, of which a considerable part was dic- 
tated into my mind and jxjn by my secret love. 

The public appearance of my works was of unex- 
pected success. The loud applause raised my self- 
reliance. Curiosity soon made known the name of 
the author, and I reaped everywhere caresses. 
The success of my first book lit again the extin- 
guished torch of hope, under the light of which, al- 
though in the vanishing distance, I beheld Clemen- 
tine as my own. 

She herself rewarded me in the most beautiful 
manner. When my name had already become more 
knowD, she once in her window read my poems. 
Even without knowing the name of the author could 
she in the easiest manner guess it, from hundreds of 


128 


ALAifOXTADA. 


expressions which she alone understood. She looked 
over, smiled, and pressed the book to her 1/Oson), as 
if she wanted to make mo understand, “I love it, and 
what thou sayest therein hast thou spoken to tJiis 
heart; and It feels it, and is full of gratitude.” 

I took once more the withered wreath, which I so 
often had made the subject of my song. She 
smiled and bowed, and looked over no more. 


CHAPTER XIY. 

But nobody was more charmed through the applause 
I earned than my friend Bertollon. He more and 
more closely and confidingly joined himself to me. 
We looked upon each other as brothers. He gave 
himself up to me entirely, and proved in a thousand 
ways that he had a heart even for others. He per- 
mitted no day to escape without a good deed. I 
myself learned only through accident this beautiful 
act of his. 

‘‘ Oh, Bertollon !” I cried once, while pressing him 
with violence to myself, “what a man art thou I 
Why must I pity thee in the same degree that I 
admire thee !” 

“Thou dost in both too much, for I do not de- 
serve the one nor the other,” answered he, with a 
gentle smile. 

“ No, Bertollon, that is lamentable that thou art 
good and virtuous without wishing to bo. Thou 
callest virtue enthusiasm and monotonousness of 
ideas, and yet unceasingly thou fulfillest its com- 
mands ” 

“Well, Alamontada, then be contented with that. 


AI.AMONTADA. 


120 


Why (lost tliou lire thyself out coiitinuully on ir;y 
conversion? When thou growest older, I see thy - 
self follow my footsteps. For the present be nt 
least tolerant. The same child has, perhaps, only a 
double name.” 

“I doubt. Couldst thou, Bertollon, plunge thy- 
self voluntarily into misery in order to sustain the 
just cause ?” 

“But what dost thou call the just cause? Thy 
ideas are not clear.” 

“ If thou couldst save Montpellier from destruc- 
tion through self-sacrifice, wouldst thou be able to 
suffer for that life-long poverty, or even death?” 

“Mr. Colas, thou ort enthusiastic again. Only 
enthusiasts can demand and bring such sacrifices. 
And it is good in this world that there are such ])eo- 
pie. But do once come to thoughtfulness. It hurts 
me that thou continually nurseth wrath. In this 
manner thou wilt never become fortunate. Run 
through the whole world and collect the fools to- 
gether that will go for thy theories into death, thou 
wilt find among hundreds of millions not a single 
man. Everything is only under certain circum- 
stances true, good, useful, just, beautiful. The ideas 
of mankind are everywhere different. How many 
hav meant to save the world with their death ? 
They died for their power of imagination, and not 
for the world, and became afterwards ridiculed as 
fools.” 

“ I could hate thee, Bertollon, for these words.” 

“ Then thou wouldst, according to thy own the- 
ories, be not ^altogether too virtuous.” 

“If thou couldst incre.ase tliy riches thereby that 


130 


ALAMONTADA. 


thou wouldßt push mo into misery, wouldst thou 
push me into misery ?” 

“ For such a question I could hate thee, Colas.” 

“And yet I was able to ask it. Thou aimest 
always, as thou sayest, only after that which thou 
callest useful. Thou weigbest always, as thou say- 
est, the deed 'by the goodness of the success ” 

“ Dear Colas, I see it already thou wilt become a 
poor lawyer and gather few treasures if thou wilt 
defend only that cause which is after thy opinion 
just and never the unjust, if thou couldst in that way 
gain a profit.” 

“ I swear to thee, Bertollon, I would despise my- 
self as long as I lived if I should once move my lips 
to accuse innocence or protect vice.” 

“And yet, thou good hearted little fool, thou wilt 
havto do it more than once, because thou dost not 
always find man’s guilt or innocence inscribed on his 
forehead. Go ! thou wilt be the world’s fool if thou 
canst not walk the same way with it.” 

So we often quarreled with each other. I some- 
times did not know how to take him. I could hav 
feared him if he had not always told me his terrible 
opinions in so playful a manner as if he himself did 
not l)e’icve them. lie only loved to get me into an 
excitement, and when he had succeeded he laughed 
heartily. But his deeds contradicted his words. 


ALAMONTADA. 


131 


p 


CHAPTER XV. 

Madame Bertollon, on the other hand, exhibited 
daily more the beautiful spirit that dwelt within her. 
She burned with virtue, which she practiced with re- 
ligious zeal. 

I became her table-companion. Alone with her I 
lived through the long winter evenings. She learned 
from me to play the harp. Soon I could accompany 
her charming singing with my lute. She sang 
my songs, and with deep feeling. She was en- 
chanting. Her beauty could hav been dangerous to 
me if my heart had not been fixed on Clementine. 

Bertollon smiled when I spoke to him of her with 
enthusiasm. When I reproaced him, that he could 
leave such an amiable being so completely to herself, 
he answered: “Our taste is different. Leave to 
every one his own. Wouldst thou, dear despot, ask 
that all beads and all hearts should be molded after 
the model of thy own? I know, my wife does 
not lose anything by my absence. She, therefore, 
is not unhappy that I treat her so, as it is customary 
in the married life of the educated classes. She 
knew this beforehand. Dost thou feel well in her 
society, I am glad of it, and I like it, if she finds 
entertainment in thy society. Thou seest, virtuous 
Colas, I also am capable of great sacrifice. For I 
leave thee to her often when I would most longingly 
desire to hav thee with me.” 

I had finished my studies and had received the 
degree of doctor of laws and a license to appear as 
an attorney before the tribunals of the kingdom. 
My multiplied work in the' mean time made my visits 
to Madauie ßertollon less frecjuent. But the more 


132 


ALA-MONTADA. 


gladly she received me then every time ; the more 
vividly 1 felt how dear she was to me. We did not 
say to ourselvs, in words, how necessary we had be- 
come to each other, but each betrayed it to the other 
in mien and in heartiness of conduct. 

Sometimes it seemed to me as if she was sadder 
than at other times, and then again she was more 
attentiv and devoted. Sometimes she seemed to 
treat me with strange coldness and reserve, and then 
again with sisterly tenderness to quiet me over my 
anxiety. This chaogeableness of behavior was 
strange to me, but in vain I attempted to discover 
the source thereof. Nevertheless it remained not 
hidden from me that she was no longer the always 
cheerful and even dispositioned cne of former days. 
I often found her with eyes red from weeping. She 
sometimes spoke with odd enthusiasm of the happi- 
ness of the seclusion of convent life. Thereby she 
withdrew from her customary society more and 
more. A concealed melancholy gnawed at the 
bloom of her young life. 

These observations made me also sad. I often 
vainly endeavored to cheer her up. The melancholy 
of her looks, the fading roses in her cheeks, her deep 
silence and her eifort to hide from me the grief that 
sickened her heart, under artificial merriment, mixed 
with my f riendship the mild warmth and tenderness 
of sympathy. How gladly would I hav put my life 
at stake to procure for her happier days. 

Once, in the evening, as I accompanied her sing- 
ing with my harp, a sudden gush of tears interrupted 
her voice. Startled, I leaned back the harp. She 
arose and wanted to tlee into her pabi^et, lu order 
not io show her pain to me. 


ALAMONTADA. 


133 


How touching are virtue, beauty, and innocence in 
the moment of silent suffering ! 1 seized her hand 

and held her back. 

“ No,” she cried, “ leave me!” 

“ But so to leave you is impossible for me. Re- 
main. May I not know your sorrow ? Am 1 not 
your friend ? Do you not yourself call me thus ? 
And does this beautiful name not give me the right 
to inquire after your affliction, which you in vain try 
to conceal from me ?” 

“Leave me. I conjure you, leave mo !” cried she, 
and would free herself from me with feeble strength. 

“ No. You are unhappy,” said I. 

“ Alas, unhappy !” sighed she with unrestrained 
pain, and her beautiful face sank on my breast in 
order to hide her tears. 

Involuntarily I elapsed my arms around the gentle 
sufferer. I, too, was overcome by melancholy sym- 
pathy. I stammered to her words of consolation, 
and begged her to quiet herself. 

“Alas, unfortunate I am 1” cried she with violence 
and sobbing. I dared not, with untimely words of 
consolation, avert the storm of her emotions. I 
allowed her to cry herself out, and led her back to 
the arm-chair, as I felt she grew weaker and trem- 
bled. Her head remained on my breast. 

“ You do not feel well ?” said I timidly. 

“I am getting better!” she answered. After a 
while she became more quiet. She looked up and 
saw my eyes wet. “ Why do you cry, Alamontada 
she whispered. 

“ Can I remain untouched at seeing your grief ?” 
answered I, while I stooped down to her. Silent, 
hand in baud and eye in eye, we sat there, lost in 


134 


ALÄ.MO^’TADA.. 


our feelings. A tear stole over her cheeks. I 
slowly bent toward her, and kissed it away, and 
drew the suffering one closer to my heart, insensible 
of what I did. My lips burned upon hers, and I felt 
my kiss softly returned. We remained embraced 
and our tears evaporated on our glowing cheeks. In 
our kisses flamed an intoxicating fire, and what we 
termed friendship had changed into love. 

We separated. Ten times we separated, and just 
as often I sank upon her neck and forgot separation. 

Staggering like a drunkard, I arrived in my room; 
harp, wreath, and window scared me. 


CHAPTER XVI. 

In a greater confusion I had never been than on 
the following morning. I appeared incomprehensi- 
ble to myself and wavering between contradictions. 
Madame Bertellon seemed to love me; heroically 
had she hitherto battled against a passion which 
stained the nobleness of her soul. It was I, misera- 
ble wretch, who, without loving her, could side with 
her passion and blow on an unfortunate flame, by 
which she was consumed, and I, more than the un- 
fortunate one, must become disgraced. 

In vain I recalled to myself the sacredness of my 
duties; in vain I laid bare to myself the shameful 
ingratitude which I committed against Bertollon’s 
generous friendship ; in vain I thought of Clemen- 
tine’s and my quiet vows ; all that was once charm- 
ing and venerable to me liad lost power and influ- 
ence. The intoxication of my senses continued un- 
interruptedly ; before my fancy floated only Bertol- 
lon’s amiable wife ; I still felt on my lips the glow 


AL'.MOXl’ADA. 


l'iö 

of hrr returned Ids.«, nnd my tlfittered vanity de- 
stroyed with deceiviiipj conclusions and inferences the 
earnest warnings of my conscience. 

“Wretched one, thou wilt yet regret, thou wilt 
once blush before thy shameful deed, and even the 
frost of old age will not be able to cool the burning 
of the troubled conscience within thee !’’ So I spoke 
to myself. I tried to be strong. While I yet in- 
dulged in the remembrances of the past evening, and 
gloomy forebodings made me tremble, I seated my- 
self at the table, in order to write to Madame Ber- 
tollon, to describe to her the danger in which we 
both were placed through our intercourse, and to tell 
her, that I, in order to remain worthy of her friend- 
ship, had to leave her, had to leave Montpellier. 

And while holy reason dictated its commands to 
my pen, and I desired to make to virtue the first 
great sacrifice, I wrote to Madame Bertollon the 
most sacred oaths of love; I lied to her, how I was 
consumed by secret' passion, and howl only in her 
love could find my heaven. I implored, I conjured 
her, not to let me perish, and unfolded before her 
fancy an exciting picture of our happiness. 

I sprang up. I read, and read, and tore the letter 
in pi(ces, and wrote a second one, and wrote all of 
the former again, and read and tore it again. As 
by an unknown power I was dragged against my 
will toward the crime before which in vain ray soul 
shuddered. While I took an oath, took an oath in 
a half-loud voice, to leave yet this very day for 
Nismes, and never again to look upon the walls of 
Montpellier, I vowed silently to myself never to 
forsake the angel-like, unfortunate woman, and to 


136 


ALAMONTADA 


cling to her, even if I should draw unavoidable death 
with her kisses. 

It seemed to me as if two souls with equal 
strength and skill were wrestling within me. But 
my reflection grew obscure ; the feeling of duly 
died in the feeling of all-consuming passion. I re- 
solved to hasten to Madame Bertollon. Perhaps 
she also, on account of her exhibited weakness, tor- 
mented herself with reproaches ; perhaps she also 
thought of fleeing from me and Montpellier. I 
would hold her back. I wanted to reason away her 
objections, and preach to her the justification of our 
love. 

I sprung up and toward the door. “ To perish 
then it cried within me. “ To perish after all the 
glory of long preserved inmost innocence?” I fal- 
tered and stepped back. 

“ Be pure like God and remain so ! This day and 
this storm pass away, then thou art rescued !” said I 
to myself. 

This religious sentiment lifted me up. The 
thought. Be pure like God ! always made itself 
heard above the turmoil of my wild passion, and 
held me back, at least for this time, from hastening 
at once to Madame Bertollon. But undecided the 
battle remained. My longing now became louder, 
and I almost mocked at my own religiousness. 

Then the door of my room was opened. Mr. Ber- 
tollon stepped in. 

“What art thou doing, dear Colas? Thou dost 
not feel well?” said he. Not until now I observed 
that I had thrown myself upon the bed. I sprung 
up. lie offered me his hand, but I was without 
courage to giv him mine. 


ALAMONTADA. 


137 


“ But what aileth thee ? Thy look is so disturbed, 
Colas ! Thou lookest pale !” said he again. But I 
could not answer. 

“ Disclose to him all that has happ.ened !” it ex- 
claimed within me. “ To the husband disclose all, 
all ; then is at once erected the eternal partition-wall 
between thyself and his wife, and thou remainest 
pure, dost not become seducer of a wife, a traitor to 
thy noble benefactor, deceiver of thy friend !” 

“Bertollon, I am miserable because I love thy 
wife !” said I quickly and with fear. I would not end 
the confession. And hardly had I thrust forth the 
last syllable when I regretted it, but now too late. It 
was done. The husband knew it all. But for once 
I was rescued. 

In the wild paroxysm of sensuality, when ])ower- 
ful passion battles with our sense for duty, only a 
sudden, decisiv action, which we acknowledge to be 
means of rescue, can save. We must, as it were^ 
drive by force the slow body to exercise it until we 
can go back no more. I felt as one being tossed be- 
tween the waves of the ocean, to whom, at the point 
of drowning, the indistinct branches of the shore 
Üoat before the dim eyes in stupefaction, and an in- 
ner voice says, “ Seize them !” 

Bertollon grew pale and said, “What dost thou 
say. Colas ?” 

“ I must away. I must leave Montpellier, must flee 
thee and thy wife, for I love her !” answered I. 

“ Thou art a fool, I believe !” said he, smiling, and 
regained his color. 

“ U Bertollon, I am in earnest. I must not remain 
here. Thy wife is a noble woman. But I am afraid 
my intercourse with her becomes dcstriictiv to thee 


138 


ALA MONT ADA. 


and me. Yet it is time. Thou art my friend, my 
benefactor; I shall not deceive thee. Take this bit- 
ter confession as a proof of my love for thee. I am 
too weak to be always master of myself, and thy 
wife is so amiable that I could not be indifferent at 
her side.” 

A saint like thee. Colas,” said Bertollon, laugh- 
ing loud, “who to the husband himself confesses the 
secrets of his heart in pious devotion, is dangerous 
to no husband. Be quiet. Thou remainest with us. 
Who will make so much trouble of a love affair ? I 
trust thee, and hav no suspicion against thee, nor 
against my wife. This may suffice for thee. If you 
two love each other, what can I do against your 
hearts? And if you would roll between you the 
whole globe, would you on that account love less ? 
Would your separation also separate your hearts ? 
Love each other. I know you both think too noble 
to forget yourselvs 1” 

He said this all so unembarrassed and merry, and 
with the tone of unsuspecting confidence, that I, 
moved, clasped him to my heart. His generosity re- 
newed my strength for the good. I was ashamed of 
my baseness, and even that I had fought so hard a 
battle. 

“No,” said I, “dear Bertollon, I would be a mon- 
ster if I could betray thy confidence and could rec- 
ompense thy friendship so shamefully. Thou hast 
now brought me again to the feeling of my better 
self. I love, and the recollection of thy trust will 
prevent any disgracing thought in me. I remain and 
will prove to thee that I am worthy of thee. I shall 
break off my intercourse with thy wife. I will 
never see her without witnesses. I will ” 


ALAMONTADA. 


130 

What do you tell mo that for?’’ iiit rr!i|)‘i d li. r- 
tollon. ‘‘Sufficient,! trust thee. Dost iIk)ii iliink 
that I not long ago noticed that my wife 1 .v(‘.s 
thee? that her love bears the color of her violent, 
vehement character ? that her passion be the more 
powerful the more she hides it? Impart to her thy 
noble principles, and cure her, if thou wilt, but do it 
with caution. I know her; her love could very soon 
change itself into a fearful hatred, and then woe 
unto thee !” 

“ What dost thou mean, Bertollon ? Shall I cure 
her of a disease under which I myself perish ? And 
what dost thou speak of the violence of her temper? 
Never hav I of that discovered even the slightest 
hue.” 

“ Friend Colas, thou dost not know the woman. In 
order to please thee she will certainly not put herself 
in the shade. And if she does forget herself once 
thy love makes thee blind.” 

Herewith he broke off the conversation and en- 
gaged my attention in a strange narrativ. He did 
not suffer that I should begin again the former 
theme. The more I had cause to admire the great- 
ness of his confidence the cooler I became myself, 
and the more resolved to separate myself by degrees 
from his wife. 


CHAPTER XVII. 

Not before the evening of the following day did I 
see her again. She sat lonely in her room, her beauti- 
ful head resting melancholy on her arm. She arose as 
soon as she perceived me; her face was full of sweet 
confusion. 


140 


ALAMONTADA. 


I approached her. We both remained for a long 
time speechless. She had cast down her eyes. 

“ May I yet dare to appear before you ?” said I, 
trembling. “ I come only to do penance for my 
transgression.” 

She remained silent. 

‘‘ I hav abused your confidence,” continued I. “ I 
should entertain only esteem for the wife of my only 
friend. I hav done wrong.” 

“And I !” she stammered with a low voice. 

“Alas, madame, I feel it. I am too little under 
my own control; and who could be so sufficiently in 
your presence ? But — and should it cost my life 
I will not disturb your peace. My resolution is 
taken and irrevocable. I hav disclosed to your hus- 
band the innermost of my heart.” 

“Disclosed?” cried she, scared, “and he ” 

“ He grew pale at first.” 

“ He grew pale?” she stammered. 

“ But with confidence in you, Madame, and with 
a confidence greater than my virtue, he attempted to 
dissuade me from the determination to leave Mont- 
pellier.” 

“ Was that your resolution, Alamontada ?” 

“It is the same yet. I love you, Madame. But 
you are the wife of Bertollon. I do not want to 
disturb the peace of a family to which I am under 
obligations for thousands of beneficent acts.” 

“ You are a noble man,” and tears rolled down her 
cheeks. “ You want to do what I had resolved to 
do. My things are already ])acked. I dare, I will 
not conceal from you, Alamontada, that I wish never 
to hav become acquainted with you. Our friendship 
degenerated into love. I, in vain, lied to myself. 1 


ALAMONTABA, 


141 


attempted too late resistance against my wild emo- 
tions.” 

She sobbed more violently. “Yes,” exclaimed 
she, “ it is better so. We must separate. But not 
forever and eternity. No; only until our hearts beat 
more calmly — until we can meet in cool friendship.” 

She was silent. I was deeply moved. 

“ But alas, dear friend !” said she, lamentingly, 
and threw herself upon my breast. “I shall not 
survive this separation long.” 

And while her heart beat on mine, and our passion 
flamed higher, and our feeling for duty wrestled 
with it for the victory, the hours flew unnoticed 
by us. 

We confessed to each other eternal, pure, holy 
love, and vowed and swore yet to kill it in our hearts. 
We concluded that we should separate, that we would 
but rarely see each other, and even then only with 
quietness and never without witnesses, and sealed 
with numberless kisses the indestructible union of 
our hearts. 

What a wretched being is man ! He is always the 
weakest when he thinks to be the strongest.- He 
who flees the temptation, he is the hero; he who 
wilfully seeks it in order to gain the crown of virtue 
has lost it already before he begins the battle. 

When we took leave of each other we had agreed 
that I should go no further than a league’s distance 
from Montpellier. On a country-seat near Castelnau 
I should liv, and only occasionally visit the city. 


142 


ALAMO^TTADA. 


CHAPTER XVIII. 

Without delay I executed my resolution, as much 
as Mr. Bertollon opposed it. He finally had to yield 
to my wishes. I departed without even attempting 
a farewell call upon Madame Bertollon. 

Soon, in the quietude of rural nature, I recovered 
from my intoxication. I felt it, that I had never 
truly and purely loved Madame Bertollon, and de- 
spised myself for having exhibited feelings toward her 
that I never possessed. It was nothing but an in- 
toxication of my senses originated by that unfortu- 
nate love which the handsome woman could not con- 
ceal from me. She alone was to bo pitied, and my 
duty it was to giv to her her lost peace . 

As from dense fog my mind gradually emerged to 
its former clearness, and Clementine’s picture stood 
brighter and more charming before me than ever. I 
had, at my flight from Montpellier, left behind 
wreath and harp. Not that I had wholly forgotten 
Clementine at that time, but shame and a sacred 
timidity repulsed me when I wanted to touch the 
venerated relic. I believed to be worthy of her no 
more, and considered the pang of longing and sep- 
aration only a light penance for my crime. 

Four weeks passed by. Bertollon alone visited 
me. He came often. “For I cannot liv without 
thee, and yet my affairs tie me to that unfortunate 
city,” said he. 

He made several attempts to induce me to return 
to Montpellier, but in vain. I remained in my quiet- 
ing solitude and felt happier. 


ALAMONTADA. 


143 


CHAPTER XIX. 

One morning I was awakened early by the servant« 
“ Mr. Larette is without; he wants to see you abso- 
lutely at once!” said he, and Larette, one of Bertol- 
lon’s friends, at the same time entered the room pale 
and disturbed. 

“Arise!” cried he, “and come at once to Montpel- 
lier.” 

“ What is the matter ?” asked I, frightened. 

“Arise, dress yourself. You Uav not a moment to 
lose. Bertollon is poisoned and on the point of 
death.” 

“ Poisoned ?” stammered I, and sunk almost faint- 
ing in my bed. 

“ Only hurry ! He wishes to see you yet. I hav 
galloped hither by his order!” 

I tremblingly dressed myself. Strengthless I fol- 
lowed him to the door. A buggy stood awaiting us. 
We took our seats and flew to Montpellier. 

“ Poisoned ?” I asked again on the way. 

“ Certainly,” replied Larette ; “ yet there is an in- 
comprehensible mystery in the affair. A fellow, 
who got the poison at the drug-store, is in jail. Also 
Madame Bertollon is arrested in her room.” 

“ Madame Bertollon ? Arrested ? Why arrested ? 
Who had her arrested ?” 

“ The magistrate.” 

“The ma^strate? Fancies also the police of 
Montpellier such madness ? Believes the magistrate 
that Madame Bertollon could hav poisoned her hus- 
band ?” 

“He believes it, and everybody ” 


144 


ALAMONTADÄ. 


“Sir, you shrug your shoulders? And everybody 
— well continue; what were you about to say? ’ 

“That everybody believes it. The fellow, Valen- 
tin, I think he is called 

“How? Valentin? Right, the old, faithful fam- 
ily servant, the most honest soul under the sun !” 

“ Well, he has told to hav bought poison about a 
week ago by order of Madame Bertollon.” 

“ The infernal liar, that 

“And on being examined about the declaration of 
the servant, Madame Bertollon, without hesitation, 
admitted it. There, you hav it all.” 

“ Admitted ? I am as one out of his senses ; I do 
not comprehend you. What has she admitted ? ” 

“ That she had ordered Valentin to get the poi- 
son.” 

“ Horrible ! And also that it was she who had 
poisoned, killed her own husband ? ” 

“ Who would willingly own such a thing ? After 
all ’tis to be so. Bertollon had again yesterday 
morning one of his usual attacks; you know he is 
subject to dizziness. He asked his wife, as she pos- 
sessed in her room a small family dispensary, to giv 
him the customary drops, a very costly essence 
which Madame Bertollon brought to him in a blue, 
gilded, glass flask.” 

“ I know it very well, and also the essence.” 

“ She herself poured the medicin into the spoon, 
added sugar, and gave it to her husband. After a 
while he felt the most violent pains in his bowels. 
The physician came. He recognized the symptoms 
of poison. There were found traces of it in the es- 
sence that remained in the spoon. The physician 
did his utmost to save him. He demanded the es- 


ALAMONTADA. 


145 


senco for exaDiination. Madame Bertollon became 
Beasitiv, and asked whether they believed her to be 
a poisoner. Finally, as she could no longer deny the 
surrender of the little flask without creating suspi- 
cion, she gave it up. Meanwhile several physicians 
had hastened hither, and also an officer of the police. 
The affair had become known. The druggist recol- 
lected the poison bought by Valentin, and informed 
the police court. Valentin was immediately ar- 
rested. He appealed to the order of his mistress. 
Madame Bertollon was asked authoritativly about it. 
She sank down in a swoon. They demanded of her 
all the keys, examined her dispensary, and found the 
poison, which was recognized by the summoned 
druggist; there was wanting only a part in the 
weight. In the mean time the essence in the little 
blue flask had been analyzed, and the poison discov- 
ered therein. So stands the case. Now think what 
you please about it, sir.” 

I shuddered, and spoke not a syllable. I perceived 
through it all a terrible linking of circumstances, 
which neither Larette nor any other outsider could 
imagin. She loved me with an awful strength; our 
separation increased her passion instead of diminish- 
ing it. So she fell upon the infamous plan of rid- 
ding herself of her husband. I recollected her fiery, 
passionate character, of which Bertollon had spoken 
to me before. I remembered my last conversation 
with her, and how I had imprudently told her that I 
had open-heartedly acquainted her husband with our 
relation ; and how she was frightened at that, and 
inquired deeper into Bertollon’s conduct. 

The probability increased in me to a frightful 
certainty. I could well comprehend how the black 


146 


ALAMONTADA. 


thouglit might bav ripened within hcrj I saw her 
mix the accursed bowl, and, blinded by her passion, 
handing it to the unfortunate Bertollon. 

We arrived in Montpellier. I wanted to enter the 
room of my dear benefactor. “Is he still alive? ” 
cried I, yet at the foot of the stairs. I was ordered 
in a whisper to be quiet. I was denied the entrance 
to his room. He had sunk into a gentle slumber, 
which did him good, and was a quieting proof of his 
recovery. 

“ And where is Madame Bertollon ? ” asked I. 

I was told that she had left the house very early 
that morning, and had moved to her relations, 
where she, under bail of the whole family, had re- 
ceived house-arrest. It was only with difficulty, 
and through the influence of her relative, that the 
disgrace of imprisonment was spared her. I was 
told in confidence that Mr. Bertollon himself, through 
a friend, had given her the advice to fly to Italy be- 
fore it was too late. She had been undecided. Her 
own brothers had tried to induce her to make use of 
her short liberty. But her pride had conquered. 
Her word had been, “ I shall not flee, for with that I 
would plead guilty to a crime of which I am not yet 
and cannot be convicted.’’ 


CHAPTER XX. 

Beauty of form is charming only inasmuch as we 
accept it as a silent proof of a beautiful soul. It 
loses all power, nay, fills us with terror, if it is the 
ornament of a criminal. The artist may paint sin 
beautiful on the threshold of hell, and this becomes, 
by using the most loved and touching ideas of 


ALAMO^TADA. 147 

humanity as the tools of its wickedness, a thousand 
times more fearful. 

No longer without abhorrence could I think of 
Madame Bertollon. She was a poison-mixer, and all 
that which Larette had hastily related to me was 
confirmed in Montpellier, and a multitude of peculiar 
circumstances continually spread more light over the 
assassin’s deed. 

All Montpellier was disturbed through this extra- 
ordinary event. Bertollon’s gradual recovery, through 
the skill of the physician, created in every house the 
greatest joy. I left no more the bedside of my dear 
friend, whom I venerated as a brother, as a father. 

“O Bertollon I” I cried, “thou art saved I Woe 
unto me, kf thou hadst perished ! My grief would 
not hav suffered me to survive thy death very long. 
Behold, thou art my only friend, the only one I hav 
on earth ; thou art my benefactor, my guardian 
angel. Every moment I am ready to die for thee. 
And is it possible ? Could a woman, such a tender, 
timid being, a woman endowed with such heavenly 
charms, a woman whose eyes and lips so sweetly 
preached virtue, be so horrible ?” 

“Dost thou love her yet, Alamontada?” asked 
Bertollon, while he pressed my hand. 

“ Love ? The thought is shocking to me. I hav 
never loved her ; only belittling vanity, only sensual 
deception it was, that I once in intoxication termed 
love. I hav never loved her. A secret power 
always kept my heart at a distance from hers. How 
can I love the one that wanted to kill thee ? I curse 
every hour that I lived in the society of the poison- 
mixer, and regret the love caresses that I wasted on 
her. Alas, I did not know her 1” 


148 


ALAMONTADA 


Meanwhile the prosecution against the wife of 
Bertollon had begun. But the most renowned advo- 
cate of Montpellier, Mr. Menard, offered himself vol- 
untarily to the family of the accused one to become 
her defender in court. Menard had never yet lost a 
cause. The charm of his eloquence conquered every- 
thing ; where he could not convince reason, he knew 
how to entangle it in inextricable doubts, and again 
to set in commotion all feelings of the heart. When 
he spoke in court, the halls were filled with listeners, 
who, for his sake, often came from distant regions. 
He undertook, and never unsuccessfully, even the 
most difficult causes, when he could expect to be 
richly rewarded. 

‘‘I ask nothing,” said Bertollon, “but that I be 
separated from the poison-mixer forever. 1 insist 
upon no other punishment for her unsuccessful 
attempt. Her own conscience and public contempt 
are thorns enough for her. Menard is, I know it, 
personally opposed to me. He was once my rival. 
I see beforehand that he will, through his artifices, 
blindfold and confuse judges and people to such an 
extent that my shameless wife will, after all, tri- 
umphantly emerge from this affair.” 

“That he will not !” cried I with fiery enthusiasm, 
“ I beg thee, Bertollon, although I am only a begin- 
ner, who never spoke in court, entrust me with thy 
affair. Trust me and the just cause. It does not 
hurt me at all to enter the tribunal against a woman 
whom I once called friend, and who has drowned me 
in criminal favors. Thou art my brother, my bene- 
factor; thy cause is a sacred one.” 

Bertollon smiled ; but he expressed to me at the 
same time his fears that I was not a match for the 


ALAMONTADA. 


149 


skill of my opponent. He consented, finally, and 
apparently with fear, to my proposal that his cause 
should become the first trial of my skill. 

“ Be not anxious, dear Bertollon!” said I; “friend- 
ship will make me enthusiastic, and uphold me if I 
should once falter under Menard’s superior powers. 
With all his cunning he will not be able to deny away 
facts that his client has all too hastily admitted.” 


CHAPTER XXI. 

Since time immemorial no lawsuit had created a 
greater sensation than this, which was equally im- 
portant through the terribleness of its nature, as 
well as through the social position of the persons 
acting therein. Ah, and the part that I was to act 
therein ! Ho one knew the relation in which Madame 
Bertollon had been standing to me. No one fancied 
that I once had lain on the heart of this accused in 
the intoxication of the highest bliss. No one knew 
that her illegal affection for me had perhaps given to 
htr hand the first direction toward mixing the poi- 
soned cup. 

All this was yet a secret; it was to remain a se- 
cret. O.ily if Menard’s skill was threatening to be 
vi(;torioup, should also these last mines be exploded 
against him. When it became known in Montpellier 
that I was Bertollon’s advocate, the victory was 
given in advance to my opponent. After sufficient 
examination and hearing of witnesses Menard and I 
were allowed to appear before the bar. 

The powerful orator seemed merely to mock at me. 
He sheer despised to appear opposit a young man. 


150 


alamoxtada. 


who only a short time ago had been his pupil and 
now was about to make his masterpiece. He spoke, 
and spoke with such power that I myself was most 
deeply moved and almost won over to the cause of 
the prosecuted woman. 

The suit had already lasted, through Menard’s 
skill, half a year, where I had hoped to conquer in a 
few weeks. Menard was always accompanied from 
the court-house by the applause of the people, and I 
seemed to spend my powers merely to make his vic- 
tories difficult in order to increase his laurels. 

The beauty of the accused had won over to her 
party all young men of the city, and her former be- 
nevolence secured for her the people’s poorer classes. 
I had not to fight Menard, I had to fight against the 
secret affection of innumerable bribed hearts, and to 
wrestle with the memory of virtues in which Mad- 
ame Bertollon had shown herself. 

The more meanwhile my cause sunk, the higher 
arose my courage. An unusual power animated me. 
Menard himself began either to respect or fear me 
the further I drove him back from his first conquests. 
His party diminished the more he was compelled to 
acknowledge facts which he had placed in ambiguity 
and uncertainty. Soon I heard public praise. Soon 
I was surrounded by a small number of partisans. 
Soon I also was greeted by a stormy applause, the 
more Madame Bertollon appeared as a criminal and 
her beauty and her virtue became darkened by the 
memory of her black deed. 

As pleasing as this burning incense was to me, it 
pleased me not so much as Clementine’s silent appro- 
bation. 

Midamc Bertollon was a relativ of the family De 




lül 


Sonn-es. When H became known that I would de- 
fend Bertollon’s cause, Clementine stood sadly at 
her window- She often shook her head. She made 
a threatening motion to me. I believed to under- 
stand her and shrugged my shoulders, and could not 
be dissuaded from fulfilling a duty that was so sacred 
to me. 

As my name became more known and praised in 
Montpellier, she, too, became more friendly. Clem- 
entine seemed over my success to forget the relation- 
ship of Madame Bertollon. Ah ! I saw myself loved 
by the angel whom I worshiped. No mortal was 
more blessed than I. For years -our silent under- 
standing had already lasted. 

Yet I return to the unfortunate lawsuit, which now 
for the accused took the worst turn. Madame Ber- 
tollon could, as all facta and witnesses were united 
against her, do nothing further than persistently 
deny that she intended to poison her husband, al- 
though the appearances pronounced her guilty. I 
now insisted upon her being examined closer than 
heretofore why or to what purpose she had, a 
week before the deed, bought the poison? She gave 
evasiv answers, and fell during cross-examination 
into contrn dictions. One saw, without difficulty, that 
she a voider! disclosing the reason. All entreaties of 
her rclativs, all threats of her advocate, could not 
prevail upon her. Tbis increased the suvspicion. 
Menard conceded his cause lost, although he inces- 
santly attested her innocence. The tribunal ordered 
a eeveier imprisonment, and threatened with the first 
degree of torture in order to force a confession. 

Then Madame Bertollon undertook to defend her 
cvwn cause before the court, in which Mr. Menard 


152 


ALAMONTADA- 


was 60 unfortunate. I saw therein nothing but a 
cunning device of Menard, who now wished to call 
to assistance the touching power of female beauty to 
assist his eloquence. 

When she entered the hall a death- like, silence en- 
sued. Never was she more charming than at this 
moment. Her simple dress and the pallor of deep 
sorrow called sympathy and pity i%ito every heart 
and tears into every eye. 

Every one was silent. Every eye now turned 
away from her to me. I was to speak. But I could 
not. I was in an unspeakable confusion. She was 
the picture of suffering innocence. All the pleasant 
hours that I had enjoyed at her side awoke in my 
memory at her sight and surrounded my soul like 
weeping angels, and prayed for her, and whispered, 
“ She is certainly guiltless.” 

Finally I collected myself. I declared that no one 
would be more gratified to be convinced of the in- 
nocence of the accused than her own husband and 
myself, his advocate. But for that reason would it 
be indispensable that she should turn away from her 
the strong suspicion, that she should make known the 
purpose for which she had procured the poison. 

Madame Bertollon was very weak. She leaned on 
the arm of her advocate. She looked at me with a 
painful glance, out of which spoke love and grief. 
‘‘ O Alamontada,” said she, with feeble voice, “ and 
it must be you who insists upon it to learn my inten- 
tions with the poison? You? And here?” She 
remained silent for awhile, then raised herself sud- 
denly, turned her pale face toward the judges, and 
with a bitter tone, which expressed the despair of 
her soul, she said: “Judges, you hav threatened me 


ALAMONTADA. 


153 


with the torture to force my confession. It is 
enough. I will end this suit. I am guilty. I hnd 
intended a murder with this poison. More you will 
never hear from me. Condemn me ! ” 

She turned around and left the hall, and a death- 
like stillness followed her — a deep stupefaction ev- 
erywhere. 

Two days afterward the tribunal spoke the word, 
“ Guilty !” over the wretched one. 


CHAPTER XXII. 

Mr. Bertollon had recovered long before. He was 
happier than usual. He jested again, as former! 3’, 
over my so-called virtue-enthusiasm; he loved me at 
that so tenderl3’ that it only caused him grief wheu 
I so stubbornly stood by my principles. I on that 
account sometimes pleased him by becoming appar- 
ently of his opinion, and gave in to his favorit whim 
that everything on earth was merely play of con- 
venience. 

In the evening before the court day on which the 
sentence should be pronounced upon Madame lier- 
lollon, I was with him. We were merry; about 
midnight we were still sitting behind the wine- 
glasses, and swore to each other in the maddest in- 
toxication everlasting friends’ fidelity until death. 

“ Listen, Colas,” said he. “ Dost thou know 
Clementine de Sonnes ? ” 

I turned red. Wine and friendship tore from me 
the sacred secret. Bertollon laughed loudly and 
cried again and again: “But, little fool that thou 
art, with thy secret virtue, thou art cheated every- 


154 


AL AMON T ADA 


where. Be at least once reasonable. Why hast 
thou not told me that long ago ? She would be by 
this time thy betrothed. Well, thou shalt hav her. 
There is my hand. With prudence we subjugate 
the world; why not a girl, or a proud family ? l^or 
I perceive already that Clementine would not giv 
thee the mitten.” 

I fell in ecstasy on my friend’s neck. “Oh, if 
thou wert able to do that, Bertollon ! — if thou couldst 
do that ! Thou would st make me happy — thou 
wouldst make a god of me ! ” 

“ The better. For I need yet a divine assistance 
to another little plot. A girl like thy Clementine — 
she has a striking resemblance to her — one could 
take them for sisters — such a girl live in Agde. 
You think, you fools, that I travel on account of the 
wholesome air or mercantil enterprises ' over to 
Agde. No, I love that girl — I love her beyond ex- 
pression ; so no woman has yet fascinated me. As 
soon as I am rid of my wife I shall ask for the hand 
of this Venus of Agde. Rome sells dispensations. 
But then, Mr. Colas, I would take leave to forbid thy 
entertainments with my future wife as thou hast 
done with my first one.” 

“How, Bertollon?” cried I, astonished; “thou 
wilt marry again ?” 

“ Why otherwise ? Look here; I thought at first 
thou wouldst play a true romance with my wife. I 
thought thou lovest her really, and then I would hav 
transferred her to thee, and we would hav agreed upon 
that. It would hav been just pleasing to me. Then 
it would not hav caused this hellish scandal, and, 
with the poison, it came near going ill with me.’* 


ALAMONTADA.. 155 

But how tlicn, BertoUou; I do not understand 
thee ?” 

Well, I must tell thee, thou little fool, when I, 
in the absence of my wife in the evenings, secretly 
went through her things— only laugh; thou sees 1 1 
had not trusted the virtue of you two so entirely 
either — I thought that you would be writiog love- 
letters, classical and real ones. And the rascal, 
lank Jack, just coming down the stairs, saw me 
sneak out of ray wife’s room as I had played her the 
mad joke. But the stupid mole shot by me and 
saluted reverentially.” 

“ What joke, then ? Thou oddly mixest thy jests. 
Drink, thou shaltlivl” 

“ And thou, also. Colas. Thou hast acted thy part 
well — art a precious fellow. I bet thou wouldst not 
hav held thy sj^eech against my wife before the tri- 
bunal half as well if thou hadst known that I myself 
had put the poison — to be sure but little — into the 
essence.” 

No, certainly not, dear Bertollon.” 

Well, now, on just that account it was smart in 
me not to tell it to thee before. Now it can no 
longer do harm.” 

Thou hast been no such a fool as to want to 
poison thyself?” 

“ Well, I knew already that the thing could not 
be so dangerous to me. I was only astonished to 
find poison in the possession of my wife. She had 
written it upon the box. But what thinkest thou 
that she may hav wanted the stuff for?” 

“ That even is a riddle.” 

‘‘But canning it was. Not so, Colas. Well, on 

following morning I pretended an attack of diz> 


15G 


ALAMOXTADA. 


ziness, had sent word about it to my wife, who, after 
her custom, brought to me the essence herself. The 
physician also was ordered, so it was possible to giw 
directly an antidote to the poison. But I had put in 
only a very minute portion.” 

“But, Bertollon, what dost thou talk? Then thy 
wife is really innocent ?” 

“ That is just the fun in the thing, and thou hast 
talked thy throat sore for nothing at all. But just 
drink, that heals up again. That was a bold stroke 
in me, wasn’t it? My wife must think that she is 
fairly bewitched, for she does not know that I hav 
for all her^ cases the best pick-lock.” 

“But ’’said I, and terror made me suddenly 

sober. 

“ But beware that no soul finds out a thing about 
this. Thou, Colas, art ray only confidant, seest thou, 
and it might have terminated ill in spite of all. In 
the hurry I knocked a flask of red wine over in the 
mediein-case, and forgot to place it upright again. 
In short and in reality. Colas, I am happy. Thou 
also shalt be so. I swear to thee that on the day on 
W'hich I celebrate my wedding with Julia thou shalt 
also celebrate thine with Clementine. But what 
aileth thee ? Upon my soul thou art fainting. Here, 
take this water; champagne never agreeth with 
thee.” 

He laid one arm around me while he handed me 
the glass. Shuddering, I pushed him back. I was 
stupe iied by that which I had heard.” 

“ Oo to sleep,” said he. 

I loft him. hTughing, he staggered after me. 


ALAMONTADA. 


157 


CHAPTER XXIII. 

Midnipjht had long past; morning approaching. 
Into my eyes came no sleep. I did not even undress 
myself, but ran up and down my room in violent 
emotion. What a night ! What had I learned ! I 
was not yet able to believe such a horrible crime, 
against which all nature rebels. An innocent, virtu- 
ous woman, who had never offended the husband, 
plunged into imprisonment and life-long disgrace ! 
Misusing the friend to defend the hellish deed and 
to torment innocence upon the torture, more bitter 
than death can be. 

I felt well, when I thought Bertollon, with all 
this, only wanted to put my friendship to the test, 
for, could he possibly hav acted so frightfully, how 
might he dare, his life long, to hav a glass of wine 
cross his lips, since every drop of it threatened to 
reveal his secret? How could he disclose himself to 
a wicked one ? How much less uncover to an hon- 
est man his whole contemptuous sinfulness ? 

But in vain I wished to be deceived. ’ Ills expres- 
sions about me and his unfortunate wife, and how 
he then would gladly hav transferred the wife to 

me Alas ! everything was only too certain ! 

Now it dawned before me in the darkness of his 
former plans. I recollected the many of his dropped 
expressions, and that he it was who led me to Mad- 
ame Bertollon, and never wanted to distrust the virtue 
of us both. And when he spoke to me about the 
violence of her temper he prepared then his designs 
to load a crime upon her. Perhaps he regretted that 
I became no adulterer ! 

The morning had dawned, and I stood yet without 


158 


ALA.MOKTADÄ. 


resolution. Innocence must be rescued; but her 
rescue was the destruction of my benefactor, of 
my first, my only friend ; only an over-abund- 
ance of love for me and an intoxication of wine 
had elicited the terrible confession; should I go 
and betray him? He was the creator of my for- 
tune; should the hand that had received from 
him innumerable alms ungratefully fling him into 
the vast abyss ? Alas ! and him whom I still loved, 
the only one, I should lose ! 

“Unfortunate linking of events I” sighed I. “ Why 
must I become the instrument to put innocence in 
chains or to kill my benefactor?” 

But my conscience cried. Be just before thou wilt 
be kind I Whatever may be the consequences of our 
acts, which we exercise dutifully, and must we de- 
stroy ourselvs, nothing should keep back, if virtue is 
at stake. You may plunge back into your poverty 
and go lonely and friendless through the world, only 
preserve thy independence and carry within thee the 
silent consciousness, Thou didst as thou shouldst, as 
a just man. There is a God, be pure, as he is i 

I wrote to the police officer of the ward to betake 
himself at once, on account of very important affairs, 
to me. lie came. I went into Bertollon’s room, 
and the officer remained before the door outside. 

Bertollon still slept. I trembled. Love and pity 
overwhelmed me. “ Bertollon 1” I sighed, and kissed 
him. 

lie awoke. I permitted him, while talking about 
unimportant matters, to collect himself. 

“Tell me,” said I, finally, “is thy wife really 
guiltless ? Hast thou really . thyself poisoned the 
essence ?” 


ALAMONTADA. 


l'>9 

He looked at me with a stariog, penetratiug look, 
and answered, “ Be silent !’* 

“ But, Bertollon, this answer is a confirmation of 
thy last night’s testimony. .1 conjure thee, quiet 
me. Hast thou done it all ? or wouldst thou me only 

jj 

Bertollon raised himself up and said, “Colas, I 
trust thou art prudent !” 

“ But speak ! Bertollon, to-day the court will 
pronounce the sentence upon thy wife. Do not let 
innocence perish.” 

“ Art thou mad. Colas ? Shouldst thou hav the 
desire to become a traitor to thy friend ?” 

While he stammered this, I saw him in violent 
emotion. He had turned very pale, and his lips be- 
came livid, and his eyes stared horribly before him. 
All taught me only too surely that he in the night 
during his intoxication had acknowledged things be- 
fore which he now himself was frightened, as he 
found them no more secure with me. 

I laid ray hand on his shoulder and whispered into 
his ear, “ Bertollon, dress thyself, take gold enough 
with thee, and flee ! I take care of all the rest ! ” 

With a look that would pronounce my death he 
said, “ Why ? ” 

“ Flee, I say. It is yet time.” 

“ Why ?” replied he. “Hast thou in mind — or, 
perhaps, already” 

“ For the sake of all that is dear and sacred to 
thee, flee, I say.” 

While I whispered this to him, he spning hastily 
up, ran undressed about the room, as if he were 
searching. I thought he had in the surprise forgotten 
that his clothes were lying at his bedside. While 1 


ICO 


ALAMONTADA. 


Stooped to reach them to him a pistol shot resounded 
and the blood streamed down over my breast. 

The door opened and the police officer stepped in 
scared. Bertollon, still holding in one hand the dis- 
charged pistol, in the other a second one, looked stu- 
p fied at the unexpected appearance. 

“ Accursed dog ! ” cried he to me, with tne dis- 
torted features of despair, and enraged flung the un- 
loaded pistol against my head. A new shot was 
fired. Bertollon had shot himself. He staggered 
toward me. I caught him in my arms. His head 
was shattered in pieces. 

My senses left me. I sunk to the floor and awoke 
again under the busy hands of the physicians and the 
servants in my room. My wound, under the left 
shoulder, had been examined, dressed, and found 
perfectly harmless. 


CHAPTER XXIV. 

Everybody was in the greatest consternation. 
Several of Bertollon’s friends were standing before 
me. Everyone pressed me with questions. 

I freed myself from them, and as soon as I had re- 
covered I put fresh clothes on and ordered a sedan- 
chair, that I might be carried to the court-house. 

Bertollon’s suicide in the mean time had become 
known throughout the city. An immense crowd of 
people surrounded the house. As soon as it became 
known that I would go to the court-house the curious 
crowd followed me. 

Already in secret sessson of court the sentence had 
been passed upon Madame Bertollon. In the mo- 
ment that she was led into the court-room in order to 


AliAMONTADA. 


161 


hear her seatence pronounced before the public, I 
also entered. 

I begged to be heard, as I had important disclos- 
ures to make. The permission to speak was given 
me. A stillness took possession of the court-room, 
as if life had fled from every breast. 

“You judges,” said I, “once I stood here, an ac- 
cuser of innocence. I come to save it, and to pre- 
pare for it its due triumph. I was deceived by the 
appearance of circumstances; deceived, misused by 
my friend, and participator in a cruelty without 
knowing it. The unfortunate ore whose sentence 
you are about to pronounce is guilty of no crime ! ” 

I now related minutely the history of the past 
night; related the suicide of Bertollon and his at- 
tempt to rob me of my life. Beside me stood the 
testifying police officer, and lank Jack, who remem- 
bered to hav seen Mr. Bertollon come out of his wife’s 
room with a burning candle, the evening before the 
poisoning scene. 

Such a solution of this lawsuit, in which I in the 
beginning had gained such a grand victory over my 
opponent, Mr. Menard, and which was to establish 
my reputation throughout the whoie country, nobody 
had expected. During my speech astonishment and 
horror were visible in every foce. But when I was 
silent there arose a murmur, and this murmur grew 
into a loud huzza. The people cried my name with 
enthusiastic joy, and the eyes of the bystanders were 
wet with tears. 

It was no longer possible to preserve order in the 
court-room. Madam Bertollon had swooned under 
the congratulations of those surrounding her. Tho 
vice-governor of the province, a relativ of Marshal 


162 


ALAMONTADA 


de Montreval, whom curiosity or accident had 
brought into the court-room, left his elevated seat 
and embraced me publicly. Mr. Menard followed 
his example, under the applause of the enthusiastic 
people. 

I desired to be conducted to Madam Bertollon. 
My limbs refused to support me. I sunk down 
strengthless, and pressed my tearful eyes upon her 
hand. 

*‘Can you forgiv me?” stammered I. 

With a look full of unspeakable love, with a 
heavenly smile, she looked down upon me. 

“ Alamontada,” she sighed lightly, and tears hin- 
dered her further words. 

The session of the court had to be adjourned. 
The judges embraced me. In vain I wished to come 
back to Madam BertoUon. The tumult was too 
great. I was led through the dense crowd of people, 
which overloaded me with tokens of honor, down the 
steps of the palace. 

About to enter the sedan-chair, I was stopped by 
a young, well-dressed man. 

** You cannot,” said he, “ you cannot possibly, 
with agreeable feelings, return to a house, sir, which 
still contains the corpse of a suicide, and which must 
everywhere remind you of the terrible events. 
Grant to me the honor, I beg you, sir, at least for 
the present, to entertain you at my house.” 

This invitation, made with such true cordiality, 
came, nevertheless, unexpectedly to me. Tears still 
sparkled in the eyes of the young man. He begged 
so entreatingly that I could not decline. He pressed 
my hand with warm gratitude, gave an order to the 
sedan carriers, and disappeared- 


ALAMONTADA, 


163 


Always followed by the cheering crowd of people 
through the streets of the town, I arrived finally, but 
very slowly, before the house of my unknown friend. 
I only noticed that it was in the neighborhood of 
Bertollon’s house and in the street where Clementine 
lived, which, to me, as confused and stupefied as I 
was, could be no disagreeable discovery. 

At the stairs, in the interior of the house, the 
sedan-chair was opened. The friendly stranger was 
already awaiting me. I found myself in a large, 
magnificent building. Two man-servants led me up 
the marble stairs. 


CHAPTER XXV. 

All the horrible and agreeable that man’s life 
may contain was crowded for me into the narrow 
space of a few hours of this day. 

A folding-door was opened. Some ladies stepped 
forth toward me. The eldest of them addressed me, 
“ I am very grateful to my nephew that he procures 
for me the honor to receive the generous rescuer of 
innocence in my house.” 

Who can comprehend my surprise ! It was Madame 
de Sonnes, and Clementine stepped from behind her 
mother. I wanted to stammer a reply to the court- 
esies bestowed upon me, but I was too feeble. The 
loss of blood in the morning, after a sad, wakeful 
night, and the change of the most violent and strange 
emotions and sensations, whose prey I had been so 
far, had completelj^ (xhausted me. Clementine’s 
appearance unnerved me. I saw only her, speech - 
iess her, until fi-rm^ and colors before my breaking 
eye floated ia confused darkness together. 


164 


ALAMONTADA. 


For several weeks I was confined to bed and room. 
With the pains of my wound a fever had united. 
The young Mr. de Sonnes never left me; he had 
brought my scanty property over from Bertollon’s 
house, also the harp, but the wreath was missing. 
Ah, it was not known what value it had for me. 

Meanwhile Madame Bertollon had been discharged. 
Mr. de Sonnes told me that the beautiful unfortunate 
one had immediately departed from Montpellier and 
had entered a distant convent. At that he handed 
me a letter that had arrived for me in care of Madame 
de Sonnes. 

“ Probably Madame Bertollon will thank her res- 
cuer,” said he. 

I took the letter, with trembling hand. As soon 
as I was alone I read it. It since then has accom- 
panied me through all my weal and woe. 

Here it is: 

“ Abbey St. G . at B , May 11, 1703. 

“ Farewell, Alamontada. These lines, the first that I write 
to a man, will also be ihe last. I hav left the stormy life of t/ie 
great world. The sacred stillness of consecrated walls sin- 
rounds me. I hav, without difficulty, been able to separate 
myself from all that was once dear and indispensable to m^ 

I hav taken with me out of the world nothing but the wounds 
it inflicted upon me. 

“Alas, that! might hav been able to hav left also these 
wounds and my memory outside ! But they remain with me 
in order to make the last of my friends, death, the more 
charming. 

“ In the bloom of my life I must wear the black veil of 
widowhood. I exhibit therewith to mankind one mourning 
which I do not feel, and conceal another which destroys me 
Yea, Alamontada, I do not blush, even now, even on this 
sacred spot, to confess what I did not want to hide from you— 
that 1 loved you. You knew it ; you know it. Alas, and it 


ALAMONTADA. 


165 


was you who could thrust the dagger into a heart that beat for 
you alone on this earth. 0 man, you hav belied me ! You 
hav never loved mo ! It has not grieved me that my unfor- 
tunate husband has wanted to blame me with the blackest 
crime ; no; that Alamontada could believe me guilty, could 
become my accuser, he for whom joyfully I could hav died, 
that has torn the roots of my life. 

“ But no ; no reproach. Noble, dear, and still loved man, 
thou wast innocent. Blinded by appearances, thou madest of 
thy feelings a sacrifice upon the altar of friendship and justice. 
Thou wouldst, at the highest, be only miserable, but not un- 
grateful. 1 knew it well the wife of another had no right to 
love thee, and I, with my sinful love, was never worthy of thy 
pure heart. 

“ 1 felt it always, and always I went wdth too feeble powers 
into the battle against my passion. There was no being more 
miserable than I, and each of thy looks, each of thy kisses, 
perpetuated a fire within me which ought to hav been 
quenched by them. In a moment of silent despair I preferred 
voluntary death to the danger of losing ,my virtue. Then it 
was I had the poison procured. 1 had destined it for myself, 
for I loved thee too violently. Here, man, thou hast the secret 
which shame would hav prevented me to confess, even under 
the torture. Ah, misery-bringer I And thou it must be who,' 
before the judges, queslior.ed me about it. 

“ Thou hast never loved me. My disappearance will never 
grieve thee. I had deceived myself, and must suffer for the 
devotion of my innocent heart. The world pities me, but this 
pity leaves me comfortless ; and even thy sympathy, 0 friend, 
can only make my pain more acute instead of soothing it. 

“ Here, in these convent walls, I see the goal of ray short 
pilgrimage. The linden-tree before the barred window of my 
cell spreads its shade over the little space which shall be my 
grave. Behold my consolation I 

“ Ah, how sad it is to be so lonely in this world ! And lonely 
I am, for no one loves me. I am already forgotten in the 
merry circles of my friends ; my tears do not disturb their 
pleasures. I fade, like the solitary flower in the mountains. 


166 


ALAMONTADA. 


unseen and unknown ; it gave and received no joy, and its 
disappearance leaves no trace behind. 

“And thou, whom alone I hav loved, call these lines our 
farewell letter. A breaking heart breathed the words ; a dy- 
ing hand wrote them. I only fulfilled my last duty. Do uob 
interrupt my peace through an answer. I accept no letter, and 
will never see thyself again. I will pray to God for thy hap- 
piness, will dedicate my last sigh to thee, and, with the thought 
of thee, death shall lead me into the better life. 

“ Amelia Beetollon.” 

And I never beheld the noble one again. She 
perished with her virtues in her heart. I never for- 
got her. Often I wept at her memory. 


CHAPTER XXVI. 

Meanwhile Madame de Sonnes and Clementine had 
often visited me during my sickness. I was not 
treated by them like a stranger, but like a relativ, 
like a brother. 

Madame de Sonnes was a noble lady, of lively 
spirit and fine education. She did not seem to liv 
for herself, but for others. Always anxious to ren- 
der services to or prepare pleasure for others, she 
knew how to giv to those who did not object to be 
made happy by her the appearance of being her ben- 
efactors. Her goodness bore everywhere only the 
stamp of gratitude. 

And wholly alike to her was Clementine, the pridj 
of her sex. The harmlessness of innocence, together 
with an always cheerful disposition, made up her 
character. No one could approach her without lov- 
ing her. So beautiful I had never seen her, never 
fancied her. Her smile was inspiring, her look spoke' 


ALAMONTADA. 


167 


only to the »oal ; the grace of her actioQ was ideal. 
From all her friends she was distinguished by so 
much loveliness that she alone always was admired. 
And of all she was the humblest, she knew nothing 
of her own excellences, and became enraptured when 
she observed them in others. One might hav be- 
lieved she had never seen herself in a mirror. 

Since I was in the house she played the harp no 
more; also was she more bashful than formerly in 
the distance; she also came to see me more rarely 
than all others in the house; she also spoke less to 
me than to others, and yet she was the most eager of 
all to care for me ; yet it was she who most zealously 
watched for my slightest wishes, and her eyes 
beamed friendship for me. 

While thus my love grew into unconquerable pas- 
sion the thousand obstacles also grew continually 
clearer which robbed me of all hope ever to become 
happy through her. I was poor, and had nothing 
for myself but a good reputation and the confidence 
of all honest people! How little is that in the great 
world ! I had, it is true, in the Bertollon suit 
gained such a general reputation that the number of 
my clients grew daily; yet how long would I hav to 
work before I could gain a fortune large enough to 
dare to approach Clementine ? 

And daily I saw the angelic being, in her room, 
in her garden, sometimes alone, sometimes in com- 
pany. Ah ! she could know bow much I loved her. 
My silence and my speech, my going and my coming, 
were so many betrayers of my heart. 

I became daily more oppressed, more unquiet. 
Nothing remained for me but separation fron^ her, 
in order not to become unspeakably. miserable. I re- 


168 


ALAMONTADA.. 


solved at once to execute ray pUn, rented a house, 
and made known my intention to Mr. de Sonnes. 

He and his aunt resisted in vain; I remained firm 
against their wishes and entreaties. Only Clemen- 
tine did not appear, and begged not, but she grew 
more serious, and, as I believed I observed, sadder. 

“You are very cruel,” said Madame de Sonnes to 
me one day. “ What wrong hav we done you, that 
you want to punish us so hard ? You take the peace 
of our formerly so happy house with you. We all 
love you. Do not leave us, I conjure you.” 

All reasons which I might invent to quiet Madame 
de Sonnes were not sufficient. The only and most 
important one I dared not reveal. She saw in my 
resistance only an untamable stubbornness. 

“ Very well,” said she, finally, “ we shall hav to 
resign ourselvs to your will. We are to you more 
indifferent than I thought. Why is it not given to 
all mankind to let friendship strike its roots no 
deeper in the heart than it is necessary, to tear it out 
again at any moment, without pain ? Clementine on 
that account will be very unhappy. The fear that 
she may fall sick makes me tremble.” 

These words were hard blows for me. I turned 
pale and trembled. “Clementine ! ” stammered I; 
“Fall sick?” 

“ Come with me into my room ! ” said Madame de 
Sonnes, without fancying what passed within me. 

We went. She opened the door and said to her 
daughter; “He will not. Do thou persuade him ! 

I remained alone, and approached Clementine. 

Oh, what a picture of beautiful melancholy I 
Never will it become extinct in my memory. The 
terrors of an endless misery, which surrounded me in 


ALAMONTADA. 


169 


distant quarters of the globe, could not rob it of its 
life or charm. There she sat, in her simple house- 
dress, charming as a child from Eden, a withering 
blossom of blue elder hanging over her hair between 
the folds of her veil, which enwrapped it, as if she 
were the symbol of that which she seemed to need 
most — sleep, rest. 

And when I now approached her, she looked up, 
and her friendly eyes smiled at me through tears. I 
took her hand, knelt down before her, and sighed, 
“ Clementine !” 

She w'as silent and smiled no more. 

‘‘ Do you also demand that I should stay ? Only 
command, I will gladly obey, even should I become 
still more miserable.” 

“ Still more miserable ?” she replied, and looked at 
me questioningly. ‘‘Are you then unhappy with us 

“ That you know not ! You want to spread only 
happiness about you. But, Clementine, you make 
me accustomed too early to heaven. If I now, 
sooner or later — that all, your intercourse — should 
lose, Clementine, and there could come such a time 
— how would it fare then with me ?” said I, while I 
drew her hand to my violently-beating heart. 

“ Do never separate yourself from us, then we 
shall never lose each other !” she answered. 

“Would to God that I need not separate myself 
from you except in death !” I cried. 

Sh e looked to heaven, sighed, bent herself over me, 
andfrom her cheek fell a hot tear-drop upon my hand. 

“ Do you doubt the lastingness of my friendship ?” 
said she. 

“ Hav I a right to your friendship, Clementine ? 
And this beautiful hearty ah 1 will it not hav to beat 


170 


i^LAMOilTADA. 


some day for another louder than for me? And 
then, Clementine, then 

“ Never^ Alamontada !” she answered, and quickly 
arose and turned herself away with a countenance 
glowing with a soft blush. I arose. A nameless 
rapture intoxicated me. I drew her in my arms. 
Her bosom heaved under the storm of violent emo* 
tions. Her cheeks glowed. Her look told me the 
word which her lips dared not pronounce. 

Our souls blended themselvs and completed the 
inseparable union. A trembling sigh was our oath. 
The world vanished about us like a shadow. In the 
kiss we exchanged life for life. 

Oh, what bliss has the hand of the infinit ruler of 
the universe granted even to the dust, and thereby 
sweetened the lot of the spirit to be wedded to the 
earthly ! 

And when we awakened from our sacred ecstasy, 
aud I could pronounce Clementine’s name, and she 
whispered mine to me, nature around about us was 
changed, and all no more the former world. Holier 
and more beautiful was everything about us; the 
quiet room resembled a temple, and an angelic spirit 
spoke from everything, from the pictures down to 
the carpet. And the rustlmg of the twigs of tho 
trees in the garden was full of meaning, and in the 
floating shadow of the leaves dwelt a hidden, lo'zely 
signification. 

I love !” exclaimed I. 

“ And eternally !” she added. 


ALAMOäTAUA. 


171 


CHAPTER XXVII. 

A few hours afterward I met Madame de Sonnes. 
A silent fear stole over me. She smilingly came 
toward me, and said, “ What did you make out of 
Clementine ? She is filled with animation, she 
speaks in verses; she does not walk any more, she 
floats, as if with wings ! And how, Alamontada, 
why do you turn red ? I owe you thanks, but how 
shall I thank ?” 

While she said this, she embraced and kissed me. 

“ You are a good man I” she continued. “ I well 
knew the secret reasons for which you wanted to 
leave us.” 

I was so surprised that I could not reply a word. 

“ Strange enough, now, perhaps you think I had 
not guessed anything ? You always want to be the 
more acute one, Alamontada, and always are so; but 
not this time ! Do you think I had not noticed that 
you loved Clementine? Why would you make a 
secret of that, and to me, the mother of your loved 
one ?” 

“ Madame,” stammered I, more and more con- 
fused. 

“I think you would like to deny still, if you 
could !” said she in a playful tone. “I stood beside 
you both when you in the fulness of your happiness 
no longer saw the world and myself, and then I felt 
that you could well do without me at your betrothal. 
My daughter livs for you ; make her happy, and I 
too shall then be so.” 


172 


ALAMONTADA. 


What a woman I I sank at her feet and kissed 
her good hand, without being able to utter a siugle 
word. 

“ Not so !” said she; ‘‘a son does not kneel before 
his mother.” 

“Madame,” exclaimed I, “you grant more than 
the boldest hope.” 

“ I giv nothing !” replied she; “ no, my dear, you 
are the one that givs peace to us. I am mother, it 
is true, but without rights over the heart of my 
daughter. Clementine knows you longer than I. 
For your sake she rejected many a hand. She 
hoped only for you. To secure Clementine’s happi- 
ness is my duty. I also hav become more acquainted 
with you, and bless Clementine’s choice.” 

“ It is too much !” cried I. “ To be sure it was my 
resolution, some day, when I had secured for me a 
fortune large enough; I am poor, Madame.” 

“What has fortune to do with this affair?” an- 
swered the noblewoman. “You hav a sufficient in- 
come, and Clementine, wealthy already in her own 
right, is my heiress. Cares for subsistence can not 
trouble you ; and should you through a very great 
misfortune lose everything, then accommodate your- 
selvs to circumstances. You hav education, energy, 
and honesty, thus you can not want for anything.” 

In vain I made several objections. But the 
woman was too noble to feel their weight. 

“ No, sir,” said she; “that you loved Clementine 
without regard to riches, I well knew. And truly, 
the girl has excellent qualities enough to be loved 
for her own sake. Your ‘sensitivness, my dear, re- 
mains unhurt. Could you ask and accept Clemen- 
tine’s heart, surely, you should not blush if she 


ALA MONTANA. 


173 


briogs you a rich dowry. The heart which you gain 
is worth more than the miserable money, before 
which you are so timid as being too much. My 
daughter can not be happier if she marries a million 
to which is attached an unloved man j she can become 
so only through the spirit, through the noble mind, 
through faithful love, through the care of the loved 
one for her.” 

“ And ?” said Clementine, as she in her charming 
innocence lightly entered the room, took my hand, 
and looked her noble mother, with a friendly mien, 
in the eyes. 

“ Thou hast chosen well 1” said Madame de 
Sonnes, as she embraced us both. “Thou always 
carest more for the happiness of thy mother than for 
thyself.” 


CHAPTER XXVIII. 

Clementine was my betrothed. The whole family 
treated me with the greatest regard. I was looked 
upon in the palace De Sonnes as the beloved son. 
The esteem of the whole town surrounded me. I 
had reached my highest aim, and it would be tire- 
some if I should begin to picture the manifold pleas- 
ures I enjoyed. 

The Marshal de Montreval received letters from 
London, as governor of the province, for my de- 
ceased father, besides an inheritance which his 
brother, who had died in the West Indies, had left 
him. I hastened fora few days to Nismes, to ihe 
marshal, in compliance with his order. He showed 
me only the letter of the London banker and the 


174 


ALAMOXTADA. . 


copy of the Testament, without being able to giv 
me any further explanation. The fortune had, by 
drafts on the bank of Paris, been already delivered 
over to the government of Languedoc, and .1 the 
only heir. This placed me in the enjoyment of a 
yearly income of four thousand francs. 

Although 1 knew that one of my relative, in his 
youth, had gone to America, from whence never 
again had anything been heard of him, I could 
hardly believe that he had amassed so large a for- 
tune. Even the obscurity which prevailed in the 
London reports about several noteworthy things 
caused me to look somewhat suspiciously at this 
wealth, at least in so far as it was meant to be an 
inheritance, although it seemed to be too large to be 
a present for me. I wrote, not only to the banker in 
London, but also to the magistrate of the province 
in America where my relativ was said to hav died. 
But never hav I discovered more than I already 
knew. And for that reason I could not rid myself 
of the thought that Madame Bertollon, more than 
my relativ, had played an acting part. 

Marshal de Montreval seemed almost to become 
displeased with my scruples. “Enjoy your indis- 
putable property, and hav a dozen masses said for 
your cousin,” said he; “and in order that you may 
not enjoy your fortune altogether idly, come to me 
and accept the head place in the chancery office of 
the government of the province. Yet one condition 
I must make. You are not allowed to liv anywhere 
else than in my castle. I must see you daily. My 
business is extensive, and your advice is of too much 
value to me.” 

I thanked the marshal for the honoring proofs of 


A2.AMO:>iIAl>A. 


175 

bis grace. I only begged for time to coaeider the 
acceptance of a situation to the importance of which 
my knowledge was not adequate. The marshal 
overloaded me with politenesses, and sent me away 
with friendly threats if I should not soon conclude 
to accept the situation. 

Mr. Etienne, my good old uncle, was beside him- 
self with joy when he heard from me the offer of the 
marshal. 

“When thou, as a boy, earnest to me in thy linen 
coat and wooden shoes,” said he, “ O Colas, and 
when thou wast standing before mo in thy poverty, 
moving my heart, then it was as if I heard the inner 
voice of the spirit which commanded me to adopt 
thee as a child, for thou wouldst become in time the 
guardian angel of the persecuted believers. Behold, 
Colas, the Lord has done great things for thee. 
Thou standest there again now on the same place in 
the poor miller’s house, and art a highly esteemed, 
learned, and rich man. Do now no longer refuse to 
accept the offer of the maishal. It is not his will; 
no, it is God’s will. It is not his call; it is the call 
of heaven which, to the consolation of the evangel- 
ical Christians, has come to thee.” 

My uncle, and the amiable family, in whose circle 
only one daughter was missing, who was married, 
and all his friends, who were, without exception, 
secret rrotestaiils, did not cease to implore me in 
the most earnest manner. I was compelled to half 
promis to accept the position. I only wished yet to 
find out the opinion of Clementine and her mother 
about it. 

But both, as soon as I had made known to them 
offer of the marshal, were at once of the opinion 


176 


ALAMOXTADA. 


that I should not let an opportunity escape to secure 
for myself a more extensiv circle of activity. 

“ And we accompany you to Nismes,” said Clem- 
entine. “ You recollect, no doubt, the amphitheater 
and Albertas’ house? But liv with the marshal? 
No, that you must graciously refuse to him.” 

And so it was done. Wo went together to 
Nismes. I entered upon my position, and was 
allowed to rest from business in the arms of Clem- 
entine. 


CHAPTER XXIX. 

Riches, authority, and influence over the affairs of 
the province prepared for mo the most agree- 
able lot that one may desire for himself. Friend- 
ship and love blessed me. There was, at that 
period, almost too much sunshine and too little 
shade, and all grew into light, rose-colored monotony. 

The death of Clementine’s grandfather gave oc- 
casion for family mourning, and, for conventionali- 
ties’ sake, our wedding was postponed for half a 
year. That could not grieve us. We were daily in 
each others’ company, and nothing in the world 
could separate us. 

Marshal de Montreval treated me in the first 
months with extraordinary grace. But I never was 
able to treat him with familiarity, or to return his 
kind inclination toward me with any degree of 
heartiness. His friendly treatment had something 
fearful; out of his smiles always spoke something 
threatening. He was a man of intelligence and dis- 
cernment, and yet subject to prejudices, which he in 
all probability owed to the (jonvcnt education of his 
childhood years, and which he valued like sacred 


ALAMONTADA. 


177 


relics. Enervated through former dissipations, he 
was sickly, fearful of death, tormented by imagina- 
tions, and distrusting. It did not trouble his con- 
science in the least to commit very arbitrary acts, 
to become severe to cruelty, to sacrifice the welfare 
of many a man to one of his caprices, and to keep 
lewd women for himself. But at the same time he 
was very religious. The monks were his favorits, 
and guided him without his noticing it. He missed 
no mass, and was considered the most pious man. 
He smiled seldom, was mostly grave and cold ; and 
in his quiet demeanor lay something commanding. 

Already in the first days of my residence io 
Nismes I was surrounded by a holy band of monks. 
These people feared from me an influence upon the 
marshal contrary to their desires. But they noticed 
soon how little I cared for influence over him, and 
gradually left me again. But they remained very 
friendly, praised to the marshal my character, and 
only regretted in the end that I was a man without 
any religion. 

The Protestants of Nismes looked upon me as their 
head and protector. They bestowed upon me extrav- 
agant signs of honor, which must have excited the 
suspicion of the marshal, even if he had been less 
distrusting than he really was. They became bolder 
in their speeches and actions. More than once I suq- 
ceeded in gaining for them the marshal’s pardon for 
their inconsiderate actions. But instead of being 
warned by single occurrences of this kind, their re- 
ligious enthusiasm increased in oftener repeated 
strifes with their persecutors, and with a secret reli- 
ance on my protection. I in vain described to them 


178 


ALAMONTADA. 


the danger which they wilfully prepared for them- 
selvs. 

“No,” exclaimed Mr. Etienne, my uncle, “no; 
where God is there is no danger. O my Colas ! do 
not be afraid of men, for the Lord is with thee. 
‘ And he who acknowledges me before men, him I 
shall also acknowledge,’ says the savior of the world. 
Also in France the mustard-seed of the gospel will 
grow, as upon the rocks of Switzerland and in the 
forests of Germany. But we must hav men like 
Zwingli, and Calvin, and Luther, who do not tremble 
before the princes of this world. And, Alamontada, 
be like them, and God is thy shield.” 


CHAPTER XXX. 

“You are not a Huguenot?” the Marshal de 
Montreval asked me once, with penetrating look, 
when I once again had to plead for -the Protestants. 
He denied my petition, and became from that time 
more reserved than ever. 

I became aware how« little good I could do any-- 
where under these circumstances, and how hurtful, 
on the other hand, my presence in Nismes, through 
my office and the imagination of my influence, must 
become to the Protestants, who leaned on me with 
altogether too great confidence. This induced me 
to the resolution to tender my resignation. And 
only Madame de Sonnes and Clementine, through 
their entreaties, prevented me from doing so during 
the winter. The marshal was in Montpellier, and 
his absence made me happier, it is true, but also the 
Protestants more bold. 


ALAMONTADÄ. 


179 


lb was on Palm Sunday, ia the year 1703. The 
marshal, who had shortly before returned from 
Montpellier, had invited me to a feast in the castle. 

I did not feel well, yet I concluded to go. 

And to-morrow I ask my dismissal,” said I in 
the morning, smiling to Clementine ; may mother 
say what she pleases, to-morrow it shall be. And 
then, Clementine 

“ And then ?” she asked. 

“No longer our union at the altar delayed. We 
may well, with propriety, be merry, as thou to-day 
hast laid aside the mourning apparel. And a week 
from to-day thou wilt be my wife.” 

“ And then,” I continued, “ then away from sad 
Nismes and to our new country seat near Montpel- 
lier. Spring comes with its beauty; we must enjoy 
it ill free, open nature.” 

So it was concluded and sealed with a kiss. 

At that I was called away from her. I went out. 
My uncle, Mr. Etienne, had come, and begged a 
private interview in my room. 

“ Colas,” said he, “ to-day is Palm Sunday. Thou 
must come with me.” 

“ That is impossible,” was my answer, “ for I am 
invited by the marshal to dine with him.” 

“ Aufl I,” said he, with solemn voice, “ and I in- 
vite thee to the Lord’s supper. No great one of this 
earth will there sit at table with us, but we are 
gathered there in Christ’s name, and he will be ip 
the midst of us. We all, several hundred, together 
with women and children, celebrate this morning 
the Lord’s supper in my niill .before the Carmelite 
gate.” 

I was terrified. 


180 


ALAMONTADA. 


“ What dariDg !” exclaimed I. “ Do you not 
know that the marshal is in Nismes?” 

.“We know it, and Almighty God is there also.” 

“ Do you want to plunge yourselys purposely into 
misery and prison ? The law prohibits most rigidly 
all gatherings of this kind. It threatens with 
death.” 

“What law? The law of the mortal king? Thou 
shalt obey God more than man.” 

So my uncle annihilated every one of my warnings 
with biblical commonplaces. The more I became 
aware of the danger of such gatherings, the more 
vividly I described to him the possible consequences 
thereof, the more zealous became my uncle. 

“When Jesus was betrayed,” he said, “and when 
the betrayer stood near him, and when he knew that 
they prepared to take him, O Colas, surrounded by 
the terrors of certain death, he instituted the holy 
sacrame-^t of the Lord’s supper. And we, we want 
to be Jesus’s disciples, and tremble? No, never; 
and if all hell should appear in arms, it would cause 
us no terror.” 

My uncle’s mind could not be changed. Ho 
called me a renegade, a hypocrit, a papist, and left 
me in wrath. 

I returned to Clementine. She had seen my uncle 
and his vexation in all gestures. She inquired after 
the cause, but I did not dare to inform her. Under 
her innocent caresses I gradually lost my fear and 
excitement. She told me of the consent of her 
mother to all my wishes. . This cheered me still 
more. Oa Clementine’s bosom I induli^ed in fancies 
of a peaceful future. Withdrawn from the throng 
of humanity and its greedy passions, \y9qkl I, in 


ALAilONTADA. 


181 


solitude, at the side of roy young wife, surrounded 
by blossoming nature, dedicate my life to love, 
friendship, and the sciences. 

How happy were we both in these moments ! “O 
Clementine,” said T, “ in order to make others hap}>y 
no throne is needed, but alone the will to do so ! 
We can also be great in a small, unpretending 
sphere. We visit then together the huts of poverty, 
I defend then again abused innocence, and a kiss is 
my reward if 1 hav done something good. Our 
library furnishes us inexhaustible nourishment for 
the mind. Our harps resound in the evening in the 
shade of our own grove the unenvied bliss of two 
loving souls. At our table dine the needy, and the 
comforted ones will make up our society. Certainly, 
Clementine, we shall not long for the cold splendor 
of these palaces. And some day, O Clementine! 
Only the thought already thrills me with ecstasy ! 
Some day, Clementine, thou wilt be mother ! — 
mother I O Clementine !” Her kisses inter- 

rupted my words. Tenderly embraced by her, 
rocked on her bosom, we both trembled under 
imagination. 

Then my servant entered, pale as a sheet, and 
almost breathless. 

What is the matter with thee ?” said I. 

“ Sir,” he stammered, “ the Huguenots are gathered 
in Mr. Etienne’s mill before the Carmelite gate in 
forbidden worship.” 

I was much frightened. So it was betrayed. 
“And what else?” exclaimed I. 

“The mill is surrounded by dragoons. All are 
captured. Just think, the Marshal de Montreval is 
there in person. The preacher and others of the 


182 


AL\iIONrADA. 


captured heretics would escape through the window» 
thereupon the marshal gave a signal, and tho 
dragoons fired.” 

“Fired ?” I cried. “ Was any one killed ?” 

“ Four of them lay dead on the spot,” answered 
the servant. 

Without further questions I seized cane and hat. 
Clementine wept and trembled. She would not let 
me go. She was pale. She lost her speech, and 
hung with mute anxiety on my neck. 

Madame de Sonnes appeared. I related to her the 
horrible occurrence, and made my resolution known 
to her — to hasten thither, in order to move the 
marshal to pity. She praised my determination, 
asked me herself, without delay, to hasten there, and 
spoke quieting words to Clementine. 

I went to the threshold. I looked back once more 
to Clementine, saw her pale and trembling in the 
lap nf her mother, went back, kissed her pale lips, 
and hurried away. 


CHAPTER XXXI. 

I arrived before the gate. Violently I made my 
way through the crowd of people, which had streamed 
together in countless numbers, and was standing 
there gaping, burning with curiosity, and with 
shudders and joy and expectation, shoulder to 
shoulder. 

Cold with horror I saw rising above the heads of 
the crowd the shining bayonets of the dragoons, 
which in threefold lines had surrounded the mill of 
my beloved uncle. Elevated above all, upon his 


ALAMONTADA. 


18 ;^ 

horse, surrounded by a few distinguished gentlemen, 
I saw the Marshal de Montreval. He appeared seri- 
6us and meditating. 

“ Most gracious lord !” I cried, when I had reached 
him. 

He turned about, looked at me, and while he 
pointed with his crutch-cane to the mill, he said, 
without changing a feature: “ The wretches ! Now 
they are caught ! ” 

“ What do you intend to do, most gracious lord ? ” 
asked I. 

“ About that I hav meditated,” he replied, “ this 
quarter of an hour.” 

“O most gracious lord!” cried I, “surely, these 
miserable people hav offended against the law; but 
truly, they are more objects of your contempt than 
of your anger. Be merciful, gracious lord, and these 
erring ones will sink quietly at your feet, and never 
again ” 

“ What ? ” the marshal interrupted me. “ These 
people are inconvertible. Rebels they are — mad, 
daring rebels. Shall I suffer this damned weed to 
grow, until it can produce another Michaelade?” ^ 

“No, most gracious lord,” said I, and seized en- 
treatingly the hand of the Marshal which hung at 
his side. “ You are altogether too just to avenge on 
those unfortunate ones yonder a cruel deed that hap- 
pened nearly a century and a half ago.” 

“It is time to seta severe example,” said the mar- 


*The Calvinists in Nismes, in the night of St. Miehaol, the 
80ih of September, 1567, had murdered about thirty m^gir- 
trates, priests, and monks in their frantic rage; from this is 
derived the name Michaelade for this night of murder. 


184 


Al^V-MO-NTADA. 


shal, who hitherto had been undecided. He with- 
drew his hand, rode a few paces ahead, without 
minding me, and cried with loud voice, “Set tl^ 
mill on fire ! 

Half senseless, I staggered after him. I seized the 
bridle of his horse and cried, “For God’s sake, 
mercy ! mercy ! ” 

“ Away there,” exclaimed he, and threw a wrath- 
ful look at me, and swung his stick, as if he wanted 
to strike me. I let the horse go, and fell down on 
my knees before the ice-cold Satan, and cried, 
“ Mercy ! ” 

I heard the rustling and crackling of the flames, 
and saw the thick clouds of smoke rolling over the 
roof of the mill, and heard the dull, heart-rending 
cries of the imprisoned ones. I sprang to my feet 
again, and embraced the marshal’s knees. God 
knows what I cried to him, what I begged of him in 
my anxiety. But he listened not to me; he had no 
human feeling. The pious tiger looked only upon 
the burning mill. 

And soon my senses began to vanish under the 
wild tumult around about, and under the pitiable 
cries of those dedicated to death, and under the 
thunder of the guns. Those who attempted to es- 
cape the flames were shot down by the dragoons. 

Then 1 aroused myself, and rushed toward the 
mill. In the same moment a girl threw herself out 
of the window. I caught her. It was Antonia, my 
uncle’s youngest daughter. 

“Thou art saved, Antonia,” said I, and carried 
the poor creature through smoke and gun-tiring 
away, and came, without knowing it, to the marshal. 

“ The dog ! ” cried the marshal. “ I hav always 


ALAMONTADA. 185 

said it, that he was one of them ! ” I was not aware 
that he spoke of me. 

“ Down ! ” he roared again. Two dragoons tore 
the fainting Antonia out of my arms, and while she 
lay upon the ground these inhuman beasts shot the 
innocent creature at my feet. 

“liight so to the God-forgotten heretics !” said 
the marshal quite calmly behind me. 

“ O thou contemptible monster ! How wilt thou 
justify this deed before thy king and our king, and 
before thy God and our God ?” I screamed at him in 
rage. 

He started toward me, gave me a blow with his 
cane over the head, and rode over me. I believed in 
the confusion he had given orders to kill me. I 
gathered myself up, tore the gun from the hand of 
one of the dragoons, in order to defend my life. No 
one dared to touch me, notwithstanding the marshal 
cried several times in succession; “Take him ! Take 
him!’» 

While I looked wildly about me, I saw — oh, the 
horrible sight I — over the dead body of Antonia, my 
uncle, Mr. Etienne, with bleeding head. I could 
recognize him only by his form and his clothes. He 
raised an agoninizing cry toward heaven and sank 
down under gunshots upon the corpse of his beloved 
child. 

I wanted to speak to the marshal. But my tongue 
was petrified ! I only raised the eyes and the hand 
with the gun toward heaven. Then I felt a blow 
and sank down in dull insensibility. 

Until then I had preserved my faith in humanity. 
Until then I had blindly given myself up to it. 
Nourished only by the masterpieces of the greatest 


186 


AL,AMONTAI>A. 


minds of our time, bad I lulled myself into happy 
delusions. I had believed humanity by far more 
human, and freed from the bonds of wild barbarism. 
Was I not a subject of the most praised monarch in 
the world? France called the reign of Louis XIV. 
her golden age ! Alas ! and Montreval was a gov- 
ernor under Louis, and Paim-Sunday of the year 
1703 a Sunday of the golden era ! About two hun- 
dred people on this day were burned alive, or shot, 
and even the babe was not spared on its mother’s 
breast ! And all the property of the murdered ones 
was confiscated — and Montreval’s cruelty by a royal 
hand covered with praises ! 


CHAPTER XXXII. 

When I had recovered to clear perception of my 
surroundings I found myself under the hands of 
strangers and my wounded head was bandaged. 
Now and then during my insensibility I had, it is 
true, indistinctly felt that some one was busy about 
me and that I suffered pain, but quickly extinguished 
again was the perception, and I lost myself again in 
darkness, as if in a heavy sleep. 

“Thou hast, my faith, thou hast a tough life, 
thou !” these were the first words I heard again. 
An old, dirty fellow stood before me and handed 
me medicin. 

I did not see Clementine. In a small cell I lay, 
upon a hard, coarse bed. 

“ Where then am I ?” said I. 

“Art with me,” said the fellow. Now for the 
first time I again remembered the unfortunate event 


ALAMOXTADA. 


löT 

to which I owed, to all appearance, my presence 
here. 

“Am I then a prisoner?” 

“To be sure, and that by right,” answered my 
keeper. 

“Does Madame de Sonnes know of this? Has 
she not sent here ? Can I not speak to her ?” 

“ Dost thou know people here ? Where does she 
liv ?” 

“ In Martin’s street, in the house of Albertas.” 

“Fool thou! In all Marseilles is no Martin’s 
street. Thou hast fever still, I believe, or dost thou 
not know thou art in Marseilles ?” 

“ In Marseilles ? How in Marseilles am I ? Am 
I away from Nismes ? How long hav I been here ?” 

“It may be three weeks, thou poor devil. I well 
believe that thou knowest nothing about it. Until 
last night thou hast raged in hot fever. Must hav a 
good constitution. We thought to bury thee to- 
day.” 

“ What shall I do here in Marseilles ?” 

“ When thou art well thou wilt put on that jacket 
there. Dost thou know it ?” 

“That is a galley- jacket. How then? Tell me, 

am I ? I will, I cannot believe . Am I 

condemned ?” 

“Probably, as they say, for only twenty-nine 
years on the rowing-bench.” 

The fellow spoke too true. As soon as I had re- 
covered, the terrible sentence was made known to 
me. On account of threats and assaults upon the 
life of Marshal de Montreval, not counted, that I 
was proven to be a secret Protestant, and in behalf 
of the heretics in the chancery, and where I, on 


188 


ai^montada. 


account of my office, had influence, had committed 
many embezzlements, I had been condemned to 
serve twenty-nine years on the galleys. 

I sighed, but in the consciousness of my innocence 
I, without pain, put on the slave-jacket. My tears 
flowed only for the fate of Clementine. I endeav- 
ored to send a few lines to her. With a borrowed 
pencil, upon a torn piece of paper, I wrote my fare- 
well. Alas, I was too poor to bribe my keeper. He 
took my letter, read it, and tore it, laughing, into 
pieces, while he said, “Here is no post-office for 
love-letters.” 

They put the chain on me, and led me, beside 
other companions of misery, down to the harbor and 
upon the galley destined for us. It was a beautiful 
evening. The city displayed its magnificence in the 
splendor of the setting sun. Out of the dark green 
of the mountain sides, which embraced the harbor 
crowded with ships of all nations, shone snow-white 
the numberless villas, and between the almond and 
olive trees of the Bastides fluttered with all colors 
of the rainbow the thousand silken streamers. 
Through the mouth of the harbor the sight lost 
itself in the unlimited area of the ocean. 

The splendor of this panorama dazzled me and 
filled me with unspeakable melancholy. The shores 
of my fatherland seemed only to display their whole 
splendor in order to make me feel the more intensely 
what I had lost. All about me breathed joy, only I 
was forever joyless, and I only saw the limits of my 
misery on the brink of a distant grave. 

Sleepless the night passed. Early in the morning 
the galley left the harbor. When the sun rose 
above the inflamed waves, Marseilles had vanished 


ALAMONTADA. 


189 


from my sight. I was chained to a rowing-bench, 
upon which live more slaves were fastened. 

What a fate ! Now forever separated from all 
my friends — forever from the playmates of my 
youth ! Ah, Clementine, Clementine, and from 
thee ! Flung from out the lap of wealth upon the 
hard bench of a galley. Forgotten by all happy 
ones, now disgraced, among criminals. Instead of 
Clementine’s charming conversation, now curses and 
mean jokes of thieves, murderers, smugglers, and 
highway robbers. Without book, without knowl- 
edge of the progress of the sciences, my spirit, left 
to itself, without hope. The fearful rattling of my 
chains now in exchange for the enchantment of 
music and Clementine’s harp-play. No, so bitter 
death is not as this horrible change. 

“ I will bear it,” said I then to myself. “ It is 
God, and my spirit out of him. I hav not lost my- 
self. I remain faithful to virtue, and carry, although 
misjudged by the world, that self-respect with me 
over the ocean which pure souls hav for themselvs. 
I hav had to leave only that which has never been 
my own; and what I suffer is only the pain of a 
body which hitherto has not known suffering.” 

So after long years my spirit won the victory. 
Thus I hav lost the greater half of my life lonely 
and joyless. I hav grown gray in misfortune. I 
hav never again heard anything of those who once 
loved me. I had no happy feeling any more, except 
when I, in my resting hour, upon single leaves noted 
down my thoughts, and could, through tears, look 
back upon the long since vanished paradise of my 
youth. Often, at the monotonous sound of the oars, 
my grief revived in me the beautiful pictures of the 


190 


ALAMONTADA. 


past. Then it often seemed to me as if Clementine 
was floating above the waves of the ocean and 
smiled courage to me like a comforting angel. And 
I stared with tearful eyes at the beloved vision, and 
felt re-open all the wounds of my heart; but I did 
not despair, and rowed steadily on. 

I would sometimes hav taken all the blissfulness 
of my youth as the result of my imagination. But 
the sad farewell letter which Madame Bertollon had 
once written to me from the convent was, through 
accident, left me. I preserved it with veneration. 
It was the last sacred remnant of that which I for- 
merly possessed. I read it often. In distant seas I 
read it, and on the hot shores of Africa, and always 
I derived indescribable comfort from it, and rowed 
more courageously on, always toward the goal of 
my life. 

Thus hav fled now nine-and-twenty years; what 
are they ! 

Death, my often, my burningly-longed-for friend, 
is coming to release me. O my dear sir, and you 
hav had so much compassion for me as to make my 
last hours agreeable ! Our spirits are kindred, and 
perhaps touch each other again. 


CHAPTER XXXIII. 

Here Abb6 Dillon laid down his book. “This 
was Alamontada’s fate,” said the abbe. “The his- 
tory of his slavery I know only from the leaves 
which he has written at various occasions in solitude, 
and which, wrapped in a sack, with a tin spoon and 
a knife, made up his whole wealth. 1 learned from 


ALAMONTADA. 


191 


Captain Delaubin, who had long been in command 
of that galley, that Alamontada had possessed the 
esteem and, one might say, the veneration of all his 
fellow-slaves. He always was their umpire in their 
quarrels, and they obeyed his decision. Also the 
officers in the ship esteemed him. He not only was 
granted greater liberties than the others, but now 
and then he received better food. But rarely or 
never did he make use of the former, and the latter 
he always divided among the other galley-slaves. 
Was he reproached for that, he usually replied: 
‘Among us there must be no preference. Every 
kindness that is shown to me is only an increase of 
the misery of the others.’ The chaplain the ship 
sometimes approached him to convert him. But he 
remained stubbornly by his heresies, and that was 
his only fault. He seldom smiled. On the other 
hand he was rarely seen sad. He was without fear 
of death. In the greatest storms he rowed on just 
as calmly as in the quiet sea; and in the hail of 
bullets in the battle, when the danger was the great- 
est, he never even stooped. Some on that account 
considered him foolish, others bullet-proof. It was 
generally understood that he was from a good fam- 
ily. If this was not betrayed by his learning it was 
proved by the cleanliness and order in his coarse 
slave attire. When in the last fight with the Cor- 
sairs his arm was shot off, he said, ‘ Why not a span 
higher ?’ and suffered the arm to be amputated with- 
out a sigh. When he was led away from the galley 
all the slaves lamented his loss, and some of these 
rough fellows even wept like children.. 

“ This is all,” said Dillon, “ that I could learn 
from Captain, Delaubin about Alamontada. Every- 


192 


ALAMONTADA. 


where lie showed himself the same great, virtuous, 
manly sufferer, who, with self-reliant spirit and liis 
eyes fixed on God, quietly and calmly walked through 
the storms of his life. So he appears also in his 
further writings, wherein a charming mixture of 
keenness of understanding and imagination irresist- 
ibly attracts and elevates the reader. I communi- 
cate them to you afterward.” 

We were silent. Our souls were altogether occu- 
pied with the misfortune of the noble man. 

“Unheard of cruelty,” cried Roderick, “ to con- 
demn such a man, unheard, undefended, to the 
galleys'! The history of civilized nations knows but 
very fei^°5ilKe examples.” 

“ Alas, still too many !” replied Abbe Dillon. 
“ Who does not know the martyr of filial love, the 
good Faber of Ganges, who offered himself to the 
Intendant of Montpellier to suffer the punishment of 
the old father who was condemned to the galleys ? 
Did the Intendant not accept the offer ? Must Faber 
not go to the galleys where he lived until his beau- 
tiful deed became known in Parisand compassionate 
souls begged him free ? Does not Faber liv to-day 
in the Cevennes in poverty,* while his fame as a 
hero is sung and applauded in operetta of Parisian 
theaters?! Alamontada was right. We liv in a 
barbarous age. Virtue is admired only on the stage 
and in novels, and in the world of reality misappre- 
hended, despised.” 

“ But, dear abbe,” said I, “ one thing yet we must 
know. Did Clementine de Sonnes come to Mar- 


*Iii the year 1787. 

fThe opera is called L’honnete Criminel. 


ALAMONTADA. 


193 


Beilles? How happy must our Alamontada bav been 
to look upon this so much loved being after so long 
a separation !” 


CHAPTER XXXIV. 

“ When I,” said Dillon, “ brought the news to him 
that Clementine had hardly learned that he was still 
alive and in Marseilles, and had determined to see 
him, he was deeply moved. He remained long 
silent. ‘ Then she has not forgotten me !’ cried he 
finally, much affected. ‘Now I wish my life may 
endure only so long that I can once more see her. 
O Clementine ! It may be only illusion, but perhaps 
the great ruler of the universe has regard for the 
nobler of our feelings. We know the nature of the 
universe so little. And as we notice in the terres- 
ti'ial that kindred atoms always unite and attract 
one another, so perhaps kindred souls will meet 
again. Clementine, then I hav not left thee for- 
ever. Then my spirit will embrace thee as a kindred 
spirit in strange spheres. Immortal love leads the 
immortal spirit through eternity. And God dwells 
in jubilant eternity !’ ” 

To see his beloved Clementine again seemed to the 
amiable sufferer to be the most beautiful recompense 
for all his endured trials. He looked with longing 
for her coming. He, to whoso share had fallen so 
many sorrows with only so few pleasures, should also 
be deprived of this one. 

He died. I was early one morning, called to him. 
When I stepped up to him he was already dead. 
Upon his pale countenance a smile was still linger- 
ing. He seemed to hav fallen asleep with the 


^VLAMOXTilPA- 


194 

thought of Cleruentine, and entered a better life. I 
threw myself weejiing upon my knees at the foot of 
his bed, and was inconsolable as one is inconsolable 
over a dead father. 

A day later, after he had been buried, Clementine 
came. She was very ill, and accompanied in her car- 
riage by her physician. She had directly to take to 
bed again. I was called to her. She was weak and 
emaciated, but still bore indisputably the traces of 
former beauty. 

When she had learned of the death of the beloved 
slave, she lifted her weary eyes mutely, with a long- 
ing look, toward heaven. I showed her Alamontada’s 
picture. She kissed it and had it copied for herself. 
Also I had to giv her from Alamontada’s legacy his 
knife and the tin spoon, out of which alone she after 
that took the medicin and the little food that she 
enjoyed. 

She spoke seldom, yet she appeared to be cheer- 
ful- I had to tell her only of him. Her eyes were 
uninterruptedly fastened on Alamontada’s picture 
until they closed in death. By her express order the 
sufferer was buried at the side of her friend, to 
whom she was faithful unto death, and whom she, 
deceived by false reports, had long ago believed dead. 

Now it is already more than fifty years since all 
this happened, but Alamontada’s memory remains to 
me equally sacred and new. 

Let us, beloved ones, let us liv as he did ! Let us 
recognize as the destiny of our spirits their independ- 
ence, their liberation from the power of the earthly, 
and in the hour of temptation rescue their endan- 
gered highness through the look upon eternity and 
the thought, Be pure, like God I 


m. Bible Prophecies Concerning Babylon. Underwood.... 

60 . iiZükiore ProphociCB Concerning Tyre, Unuerwood . 

61 . History of the Devil. Isaac Paden * 

€ 2 . The Jews and their God, Isaac Padeu ..!!** 

<,3. The Devil’s Duo Bills. John Syphers '/ 

C4. The Ills wo Endure—their Cause and Cure. Benneift.. 

65. Hhort Sermon No. Two. Rev. Theologicus, D. D 

06 . God-Idea in History. Hugh Byron Brown 

fi7. Hixto ‘D Tru-th Seeker Leaflets, No. 2 

68. lluih’s Idea of Heaven and Mine, butan H. "VVixon,, , 

69. Missionaries, Mrs. E. D. Slenker 

70. Vicarious Atonement, Dr. J S. Lyon 

71. PaiDO’s Annive* sary. C. A. Codman 

72. Hhadiach.Mesbach.and Abed-nego. D. M. Bennett,... 

73. Foundations. John Syphers, 

74. J)aniel in the Lions’ Den. D. M. Bennett 

76. An Hour with the Devil. D. M. Bennett 

76. Reply to Erastus F, Brown, D.M. Bennett 

77. TOO Pear of Death, D. M. Bennett 

78. Christians and Christianity. D. M. Bennett 

79. Tho Belatio)'.ship of Jesus. Jehovah, and the Virgin 

Mary, W.E. Coleman 

80. Address on Thomas Paine. D. M. Bennett 

81. Hereafter ; or. tho Half-way House, John Syphers.... 

7(2. Caristian Courtesy. D, M. Bennett 

Revivalism Examined. A. G. Humphrey 

81. l£o( dy’s Sermon on Hell. Rev. J. P, Hopps, London... 

85. Matter, Motion, Life, and Mind. D. M. Bennett 

86. An Enquiry about God’s Son 8. D.M. Bennett 

87. Froethonght Judged by its Fruits. B. F. Underwood.. 

88. David— God’s Peculiar Favorite. Mrs. E. D. Slenker... 

80 . Logic of Prayer. Charles Stephenson 


t 

s 

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18 

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B 

3 

f 

1 
3 

2 
8 
• 
S 
3 
1 
8 
• 
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■ 

7 

8 
a 
1 
5 
8 
S 
B 
1 
8 
8 


SCIENTIFIC SERIES. 


1. Hereditary Transmission. Prof. Louis Eisberg, M.D... 6 

2. Evolution; from the Homogeneous to the Heterogen- 

eous. B. F. Underwood 8 

8. Darwinism. B. F. Underwood 8 

^ Literature of the Insane. Frederic R. Marvin, M.D...,. 5 

6. Responsibility of Sox. Mrs, Sara B. Chase, M.D 8 

6. Graduated Aimospheres. James McCarroll «... 2 

7. Death. Frederick B. Marvin, M.D ^ i 

a. How do Marsupials Propagate? A. B. Bradford 8 

9 . Tne Unseen World. John Fiske W 


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CHRISTIANITY AND INFIDELITY; 

A JOINT DISCUSSION BETWEEN 

EEV. G. n. HUMPHREY, Presbyterian Clergyman, 

OP NEW YORK, AND 

D. M. BENHETT, Editor of The Tmth Seeker. 

It was conducted in the columns of The Truth Seeker, a let» 
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beginning April 7, 1877, and closing Sept. 29, 1877, thus con- 
tinuing just six month«, giving thiiteen letters from Humphrey 
and thii teen replies by Bennett. 

The subjects discussed were as follows; 

Pakt I . — The relative services of Christianity and Infi- 
delity to American Liberty. 

Part IL — The relative services of Christianity and 
Infidelity to Learning and Science, 

Part III . — Is there a stronger jgrohahility that the 
Bible is divine than that Infidelity is true? 

The discussion has excited a large share of interest, both 
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Light is what we need. Let the controversies proceed. Let the 
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all the great questions of the day, w-hether of Finance, Science, 
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Biographical Sketches of Eminent Christians. 

A. JOilPASION BOOK OR COUNTERPART TO ” THE WORLD’S 
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Will bo issued early in 1877. Containincr a correct history of such 
dis.injjuishod ornaments of th« Church as St. Paul. Easebiur., Con- 
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John XII., John XIII., Alexander I., Alexander HI., Innocent HI., 
Bonifsiee Vill,. Benedict XII., John XXli..John XXIII., Alexander 
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BY D. M. BENNETT, 

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THE PRO AND CON 

OF 

SUPERNATURAL RELIGION: 

on, 

An Answer to the Question: “Have we a Super- 
naturally Revealed, Infallibly Inspired, and 
Miraculously Attested Religion in 
the World?” 


IN FOVR PARTS. 

PART L A brief history of the four great Religions claiming o 
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Religion. 

PART III. Statement of the arguments against Supern aturaw 
Religion. 

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CI^ristianity, and statement of the views of Rationalists on Inspira- 
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BY E. E. GUILD. 


TOOSTHEB WITH A SKETCH OF THE LIFE OF THE AUTno:ik 

There Is no human religion outside of human nature. 

The different forms of religion contain the elements of one uni- 
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tumanity. 

Describe to me the God whom you worship, and I see in that 
desoripticn a reflex image of yourself. 


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Holy Cross Scries, thirteen mmbers, anti-papal, 10 cents to 50 cent« 
and 75 cents; Influcnco of Christianity on Civilization, 25 cents; 
Last Will and Testament of Jean Mcslier^a Catholic priest, 25 cents; 
Chronicles of Simon Christianus, 25 cents; Religion not llistor}', 25 
cents; Resurrection of Jesus, 25 cents; Bell’s Life of Jesus, 15 
cents ; Christianity and Materialism, 15 cents ; Anthony Comstock : 
Lis Career of Cruelty and Crime, 25 cents ; Sepher Toldoth Jeschu, 
tlie Book of the Generation of Jesus, 20 cents ; The Jamicson-Ditzler 
Debate, 50 cents and 75 cents; What Liberalism offers in the 
place of Christianity, 10 cents; Truth Seeker Tracts, nearly two 
hundred varieties, from 1 cent to 10 cents each; Truth Seeker Leaf- 
lets, thirty-two kinds, 8 cents per set, 25 cents per hundred, $2 per 
thousand. Radical and miscellaneous books of all kinds furnished to 
order. Send for a catalogue. Address, D* M* BENKETT, 
141 EigtaUi ttreet, New York« 

H 50 88 . 





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